Randy Alcorn's Blog, page 44

God’s Promise of the New Earth Gives Us Hope and Perspective in Loss

Last month, I was on Dr. Lee Warren’s podcast to talk about the eternal Heaven, my new book The Promise of the New Earth, and how an eternal perspective has shaped the grief I’ve experienced since Nanci went to be with Jesus last March.

Dr. Warren is a brain surgeon, inventor, Iraq War veteran, and author of I've Seen the End of You: A Neurosurgeon's Look at Faith, Doubt, and the Things We Think We Know. I’ve been on his podcast before to talk about my book Happiness, and he was one of the most thoughtful interviewers I’ve ever interacted with. (And we share a love for dogs!) 

Here's our conversation:

I was happy to talk with Lee about the New Earth because it is rarely spoken of in churches. While all Christians believe in Heaven, they envision the present pre-resurrection Heaven as the ultimate and eternal Heaven, but biblically it clearly is not. God’s plan for the eternal Heaven is a resurrected Earth, inhabited by resurrected people, doing physical activities. Not only is this the emphatic biblical teaching, it is also wonderfully good news to all who have imagined Heaven to be dull, boring, and unearthly, with nothing to do but sing or strum harps, nowhere to go and no one to see because human relationships will either no longer exist or no longer matter.

That disembodied existence is a Greek concept that Plato popularized, and it is utterly contradicted by 1 Corinthians 15 and other passages, including Luke 24 where Jesus says, “Touch me, I am not a spirit, for a spirit doesn’t have flesh and bones as I do.” We’re told our resurrection bodies will be like Christ’s and that means they will have flesh and bones. Scripture teaches no more sin and no more suffering and sorrow. It does NOT teach no more bodies and no more Earth; rather, the exact opposite—eternal bodies on an eternal earth!

Just recently I got an email from a woman who is a Bible student and has been listening to sermons for 40 years, but had never once heard a pastor or anyone else (except Jehovah’s Witnesses) talk about the New Earth. People believe in the resurrection but have no concept of what that really means because we don’t teach them. I think the Devil has vested interests in obscuring this doctrine because he doesn’t want people to look forward to being with Christ, believing it means the end of all the things they enjoy about earthly living. We should look forward not to a non-earth but a New Earth, a Redeemed Earth!

One of our staff shared this note from a pastor they saw online: “I appreciate Randy Alcorn for many things, but I have to admit that his book on Heaven was very disappointing when I read it five years ago. His view of Heaven is very earthly, just a better version of what we have now. I can’t get behind that.”

Of course, people are entitled to not like any book, and I always welcome criticism of my books. But this comment does really make me smile, with deep irony, because so many believers just don’t get it. Like “earthly,” as in the garden of Eden, before sin, was NOT God’s plan?!?! And Earth and bodies and human creativity and culture were Satan’s idea instead of God’s? And earthly, as in resurrected physical bodies on a New Earth is anti–Bible instead of exactly what the Bible promises?

If we’re honest, we all long for a return to Paradise—a perfect world, without the corruption of sin, where God walks with us and talks with us in the cool of the day. Because we’re human beings, we desire something tangible and physical, something that will not fade away. And that is exactly what God promises us—a home that will not be destroyed, a kingdom that will not fade, a city with unshakable foundations, an incorruptible inheritance.

“But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness dwells” (2 Peter 3:13).

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

What Child Is This?

The angels must have been stunned to see the second member of the triune God become a human being! The baby of Bethlehem was Creator of the universe, pitching His tent on the humble camping ground of our little planet. God’s glory now dwelt in Christ. He was the Holy of holies. People had only to look at Jesus to see God.

When we look at the life of Jesus, we see something unparalleled in all human history. As a carpenter’s son, and especially as the eldest son, He was an integral part of the family business. He worked hard, long hours. As did other Jewish children of His place and time, He studied and knew much of the Old Testament Scriptures by heart. He was like the other children with one major difference—He never sinned. That would have made Him popular with some people, and very unpopular with others.

But let’s go back further. As God the Father directly oversees every child’s conception and formation, so He did with Jesus, again with a startling difference. In this case, the child conceived was the Son who had always, from eternity past, lived with His Father and the Holy Spirit. This same Jesus who stepped out of eternity and into time is the source of our eternal happiness. The Jesus who dwells within every believer, who came down from Heaven and returned there, will one day actually bring Heaven down to the New Earth—forever (Revelation 21:1-4, NIV).

Following are some verses and quotes about the incarnation and virgin birth, excerpted from my book It’s All About Jesus. Enjoy!

Here is the great mystery of our religion: Christ came as a human. The Spirit proved that he pleased God, and he was seen by angels. Christ was preached to the nations. People in this world put their faith in him, and he was taken up to glory. 1 Timothy 3:16 CEV

In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. …The angel went to her and said, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High…his kingdom will never end.”

“How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”

The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. For no word from God will ever fail.”

“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” Then the angel left her. Luke 1:26-38 NIV

The Incarnation is the most stupendous event which ever can take place on earth, and after it henceforth, I do not see how we can scruple at any miracle on the mere ground of it being unlikely to happen. –John Henry Newman

Christ took our flesh upon him that he might take our sins upon him. –Thomas Watson

The greatness of God was not cast off, but the slightness of human nature was put on. –Thomas Aquinas

It is fitting that a supernatural person should enter and leave the earth in a supernatural way…His birth was natural, but His conception was supernatural. His death was natural, but His resurrection was supernatural. –John Stott

Jesus Christ did not remain at base headquarters in heaven, receiving reports of the world’s suffering from below and shouting a few encouraging words to us from a safe distance. No, he left the headquarters and came down to us in the front-line trenches, right down to where we live… –Helmut Thielicke

It has never been quite enough to say that God is in his heaven and all is right with the world; since the rumor is that God had left his heavens to set it right. –G. K. Chesterton

Christians believe in the virgin birth of Jesus. Materialists believe in the virgin birth of the cosmos. Choose your miracle. –Glen Scrivener

If Jesus Christ were not virgin born, then…He inherited the nature of that father; as that father had a nature of sin, then Jesus Himself was a lost sinner and He Himself needed a Savior from sin. Deny the virgin birth of Jesus Christ and you paralyze the whole scheme of redemption by Jesus Christ. –I. M. Haldeman

Though He was God, He became a man. He was the Ancient of Days, yet He was born at a point in time. He created worlds and companied with celestial beings, yet He came to live in a family setting on earth. –Henry Gariepy

At Bethlehem God became man to enable men to become the sons of God. –C.S. Lewis

He was created by a mother whom he created. He cried in the manger in wordless infancy, he the Word, without whom all human eloquence is mute. –Augustine

No priest, no theologian stood at the cradle of Bethlehem. And yet, all Christian theology finds its beginnings in the miracle of miracles, that God became human. –Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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Why Our Subjective Feelings Need God’s Objective Truth

The peace or lack of peace one feels after praying about a decision can be highly subjective, unless it is specifically rooted in objective truths. Some people feel good about doing wrong things and others feel bad about doing right things. I have seen people make unwise and even catastrophic decisions who told me they prayed and felt good about it.

I know of a woman who walked away from her marriage—without biblical grounds—because in her words, “The Holy Spirit gave me peace about it.” When I tried to point to the truth in Scripture, she said she wasn’t going to be “legalistic.” She’s still going to church, claiming the spiritual high ground, while failing to live by the standards of the same Bible she professes to believe, often reads, and hears taught every Sunday.

She told me, “I’ve never been so close to God.” But is being close to God merely a feeling? Or does it mean trusting in and living by faith in the truth God has revealed to us not subjectively but objectively in His Word? Men guilty of murdering their wives have insisted “I loved her.” Their actions disprove their words.

Often the reason we “feel peace” may be because we are doing what is most comfortable, convenient, natural, or widely accepted. None of these is a good reason to believe we are doing right. We need to search the Scriptures to see what is true, and subject ourselves to the authority and guidance of the revealed will of God (Acts 17:11). Then when we call upon God’s indwelling Spirit to teach and direct us, He can guide us in light of what he has objectively said to us, not merely what we subjectively feel.

We should seek the Lord’s will through the reading and study of His Word, prayer, and the wise counsel of others. I emphasize “wise” to discourage counsel only from those who automatically agree with us and are not committed to speaking God’s truth. Scripture says in an abundance of counselors, there is wisdom and victory.

Some people say, “I just feel that…” as if having a feeling were somehow a good reason to believe something. “I feel” statements are sincere but subjective; they are not always based on reality. This is not to say that feelings are categorically sinful; God made us to feel emotions. We should let our feelings—real as they are—point to our need for the truth of God’s words to guide our thinking. Recognizing the reality of objective truth, “true truth,” God’s truth, is key. Why? Because what we believe about truth will inevitably affect our moral values and how we live.

Since Jesus said the truth will set us free, failing to believe and live by it will enslave us to error, sin, and self-destruction. It’s vital that we join David in saying, “Show me your ways, Lord, teach me your paths. Guide me in your truth and teach me” (Psalm 25:4-5).

John Piper writes in Finally Alive: What Happens When We Are Born Again?:

My feelings are not God. God is God. My feelings do not define truth. God’s word defines truth. My feelings are echoes and responses to what my mind perceives. And sometimes—many times—my feelings are out of sync with the truth. When that happens—and it happens every day in some measure—I try not to bend the truth to justify my imperfect feelings, but rather, I plead with God: Purify my perceptions of your truth and transform my feelings so that they are in sync with the truth.

As long as we trust our own subjective judgment that ebbs and flows with the current of our culture, we divorce ourselves from God’s eternal and unchanging truth. Once our eyes are opened to the transcendent beauty and freedom of God’s truth, we’ll never be content with anything less.

Jerry Bridges wisely counseled, “We must not allow our emotions to hold sway over our minds. Rather, we must seek to let the truth of God rule our minds. Our emotions must become subservient to the truth.”

More than we can imagine hangs in the balance concerning what is true and whether or not we believe it instead of our own subjective feelings. May we look to Jesus who is the Truth. And may God in His mercy help us to embrace and live according to the life-giving truth He has given us—both for His glory and for our good.

Photo by Sixteen Miles Out on Unsplash

A Season of Many Firsts without Nanci by My Side

This is a year of “firsts,” that is, the first of many things without Nanci by my side. These weeks have included three of the very hardest firsts, followed quickly by Christmas and New Year’s. Then there will be Valentine’s Day, and March 28, the day of Nanci's homegoing, where in God’s providence our whole family will hopefully be all together, for the first time since her memorial service, May 15.

Last week was my first Thanksgiving without Nanci since 1969, so we had an unbroken string of 52 years. (One of those Thanksgivings three years ago I brought her home from the hospital after one of her surgeries.) Then last Wednesday, November 30, was her birthday, and seven days later, December 7, is the 54th anniversary of the day we met in 1968, as freshmen in high school. I wrote this on her birthday this week:

Happy birthday to my soulmate Nanci. Her mom always used to make her this chocolate wafer log cake with whipped cream for her birthday. After her mom went to Jesus, our daughters Karina and Angela picked up the tradition. I can picture Nanci and her mom and dad and my mom and dad right now. I expect after the resurrection, on the New Earth, where we know we will eat and drink together, that birthdays will probably be celebrated (why not in that Land of Celebration?), and Nanci's mom will be making this log cake for her and the rest of us. Happy first-birthday in a far better world, sweetheart!

The next day Angie sent me this photo of a slice of the log cake she made in honor of her mom’s birthday. I love that Angie still makes it for her family.

I feel profoundly sad in some respects, yet so deeply grateful for the life God gave Nanci and I together, and it is impossible to be this grateful without also being happy. This is 2 Corinthians 6:10, “sorrowful yet always rejoicing.” And it is not just words or pretense or wishful thinking, it’s an absolute blood-bought reality, a certainty that I feel deep in my heart and bones. I sense continuously not only His presence but Nanci’s. “I lift up my eyes to the mountains—where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD [Yahweh], the Maker of heaven and earth” (Psalm 121:1-2).

Below is a blog post I wrote 14 years ago in honor of Nanci’s birthday and the anniversary of our meeting:

December 7, this Sunday, is the 40th anniversary of the day Nanci and I met. We were freshmen in high school. It was a double date in which we went to see two new movies at Portland's Village Theatre on 122nd: the original The Odd Couple, with Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon, and The Americanization of Emily with Julie Andrews.

Forty years. Wow. I love Nanci more today than ever. She is a treasure. Fun, upbeat, delightful. You name it.

Nanci and I had a wonderful day celebrating her birthday last Sunday November 30. She loves football, so after watching an NFL game, we went out for dinner to The Old Spaghetti Factory.

The Old Spaghetti Factory, the original in downtown Portland, the mother of Spaghetti Factories everywhere, opened one month after we met. It was our favorite place to go in 1969 and the early seventies. (Anybody remember the silent movies they showed you while you were waiting in the always crowded original Old Spaghetti Factory? How about the chunks of fruit in the spumoni ice cream? That was the only thing I didn't like!)

In 1969, at TOSF, I discovered their spaghetti with Mizithra, and I've never ordered anything else there in the forty years since. I don't seek alternatives to perfection, either with Mizithra or with Nanci.

(I haven't read a TOSF menu in years, since there's no point when you know what you want, but I can tell you what it used to say of Mizithra: "Legend has it that Homer lived on this while writing The Illiad." I can't think of many better things to live on while writing a book. Maybe I'll try it someday.)

Next, Nanci and I drove to The Academy Theatre on 78th and Stark. It opened in 1946 (the website says 1948, but congratulatory Western Union telegrams on the wall, from Bob Hope and Bing Crosby, say 1946). Then it closed in the 1970s and was completely renovated a few years ago. It's a charming place, located halfway between Nanci's childhood home and Multnomah Bible College where we went. It's right next to Flyin' Pie Pizza, which they serve on the theatre menu too, and people are welcome to have a full meal in their reclining stadium seats.

Then Nanci and I drove to the house she grew up in, in Southeast Portland, about 69th and Division, by Mount Tabor, in Franklin High School District. Nanci hadn't been back there in years. It was a whole day of nostalgia.

Nanci in gradeschool. Wasn't she adorable? Still is.

Okay, below I'm going to just throw in some random pics of Nanci, from my laptop computer, which is all I have with me now. So scroll down and you'll see some fun pics with brief comments. Apologies to grandsons Ty and Jack since I don't have photos of them with their grandmother on this computer. I'm winging it.

Here we are ten days ago in Florida, with Webers and Tebows. Like I said, Nanci loves football. We couldn't turn down the invitation, and became Gator fans and fast friends. Go Gators.

Nanci with our precious friend Joni Eareckson Tada last month when I was speaking at a Joni and Friends conference in southern California.

Nanci getting laughs from famous people. Notice that she is focused on the dog rather than them, and they're getting a kick out of her.

Nanci watching a playoff game between Seahawks and Packers, her two favorite teams. Picture taken at moment of action. Take a close look at Nanci's face and you can see she's into it. Dan Franklin is pumping his fist at far left, then Dan Stump, and our daughters Angela and Karina. This was pre-grandchildren, so would have been five or six years ago.

Holding Jake, our first grandson, August 2004.

With Matthew and Jake at OMSI a few years ago.

With two of her favorite people, grandson Matt and dog Moses.

With our dear friend Diane Meyer's dog. Nanci's a dog person. Which means half my birthday gifts to her were dog-related.

So, bottom line, I have a Jesus-loving, family-loving, football-loving, movie-loving, dog-loving wife, who also has loved me for forty years this weekend, despite the fact that I can be an idiot, and periodically make a point of proving it.

Who could ask for any more in a wife?

I love you Nano, and I thank God for you.

Always have, always will.

God’s Providence in Joseph’s Story—and Ours

“Providence” is a word we use frequently in talking about God, but we may not have thought deeply about what it means. Theologian Timothy George defines it as “God’s faithful and effective care and guidance of everything which He has made toward the end which He has chosen.”

God’s providence was a deep comfort to both Nanci and me as we faced her cancer. In her journal, Nanci quoted Joni Eareckson Tada: “God is not a sweep-up boy who follows you with a dustpan and brush, second-guessing how everything will fit into a divine pattern for good. God’s hands stay on the wheel of your life from start to finish so that everything follows His intention for your life.”

That quote comes from Joni’s book Pain and Providence, in a section where she writes about God’s providence in Joseph’s life:

I draw a lot of inspiration from the story of Joseph. There were plenty of unfortunate mishaps in Joseph’s life, like being tossed by his envious brothers into a pit and left to die. But later on, after more mishaps, Joseph told his brothers, “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives” (Gen. 50:20-21).

I like that word, intended. He is a God of intention—He has a purpose, a target, a goal, and a plan. Joseph’s problems did not catch God off guard. From the beginning, God calculated for Joseph to experience all these things. Why? For the salvation of others.

God is not a sweep-up boy who follows you with a dustpan and brush, second-guessing how everything will fit into a divine pattern for good. God’s hands stay on the wheel of your life from start to finish so that everything follows His intention for your life. This means your trials have more meaning—much more—than you realize.

Consider this: If Joseph had not been sold to those caravan traders by his wicked brothers, he would not have been sold as a slave to Pharaoh. And if Joseph had not become Pharaoh’s right-hand man, no one would have built giant grain silos to ward off the famine. And if the famine hadn’t happened, Jacob and his family would never have come to Egypt for food and safety. And if Jacob’s family weren’t in Egypt, there would have been no slave laborers. And if no slaves, no Exodus, and no giving of the law to Moses. And no Promised Land. And, finally, no line of Judah from which the Messiah, Jesus Christ, would come.

What an amazing example of the providence of God! It is enthralling to see how the troubles of one young man named Joseph could kick-start a whole chain of earth-shaking events which would ultimately lead to our salvation.

Joseph’s story could be yours. Only heaven will reveal the incredibly complex intertwining of events in which you have played a pivotal role. Like Joseph, you may not be able to discern it at the time, but God has it all in hand. He has it all in control. And you, dear friend, are needed in His marvelous plan to spread His kingdom in your corner of the world.

As usual, I wholeheartedly agree with Joni. Let’s take another look at this amazing story. Joseph recognized God’s sovereignty when he said to his brothers, who betrayed and sold him into slavery, “It was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you.... God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God” (Genesis 45:5–8). God didn’t only permit Joseph’s journey to Egypt, he sent him there through his brothers’ evil deeds.

Later Joseph told his brothers, “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Genesis 50:20, ESV). “God meant it for good” communicates something far stronger than God being handed lemons and making lemonade. God did not merely make the best of a bad situation; on the contrary, fully aware of what Joseph’s brothers would do, and fully permitting their sin, God intended that the bad situation—which He could have prevented, but didn’t—be used for good. As Joni explains, He did so in accordance with His plan from eternity past.

We see two wills at work in Genesis 50:20. The brothers successfully did evil, and God successfully brought about good from their evil—but His good dramatically eclipsed their evil. While God did not force them to do evil, He sovereignly worked so that the moral evil they committed, and the consequential evils that came from it, accomplished His ultimately good purposes. These purposes extended not only to Israel, but to Joseph and even to Joseph’s brothers, the evildoers.

Similarly, some of those who crucified Jesus later embraced the redemption accomplished in His crucifixion. Hence, in a sense inexplicable except by God’s sovereign grace, they became beneficiaries of their own evil deed.

How great is our infinitely holy God that He can and does use sin—including my sin and yours—to accomplish His purposes. Should this cause us to minimize the seriousness of our sin? No more than it caused Joseph’s brothers to minimize theirs. What it should do is maximize the sovereignty and providential wisdom our almighty God. Our sins are great, but our Savior is infinitely bigger than our sins!

Nothing about God’s sovereign work in Joseph’s life suggests that God works differently in the lives of His other children. In fact, Romans 8:28 and Ephesians 1:11 make it emphatically clear that He works the same way with us. Countless millions of choices and actions are contemplated every second across this globe. Our all-knowing and all-powerful God chooses exactly which ones He will cause or not, ordain or not, permit or not. He does not permit evils arbitrarily, but with purpose. Everything He permits matches up with His wisdom and ultimately serves His holiness, justice, love and grace. As Joni puts it, “God permits what he hates to achieve what he loves.”

Though events in our lives may have less drama or historical prominence, God didn’t act out of character with Joseph. Rather, He revealed for our benefit how He sovereignly and providentially works in our lives as well. Knowing this can provide great encouragement and perspective as we face our own trials and sufferings today.

See Randy's book hand in Hand: The Beauty of God's Sovereignty and Meaningful Human Choice.

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What Does Scripture Mean by the Term New Heavens?

A reader asked, “What does the Bible mean by the term new heavens? And why is it referred to heavens (plural) but then switches to heaven (singular)?”

The Old Testament uses no single word for universe or cosmos. When Genesis 1:1 speaks of God’s creating “the heavens and the earth,” the words are synonymous with what we mean by universe. Heavens refers to the realms above the earth: atmosphere, sun, moon, and stars, and all that’s in outer space. Then in Isaiah, God says, “Behold, I will create new heavens and a new earth” (Isaiah 65:17). This corresponds to Genesis 1:1, indicating a complete renewal of the same physical universe God first created.

Revelation 21:1-2 says, “I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. . . . I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.” Because “new heaven” (singular) is used here, some think it’s God’s dwelling place that passes away and is renewed. But the present Heaven is described as unshakable in ways the physical universe isn’t (Hebrews 12:26-28). The “new heaven” in Revelation 21:1 apparently refers to exactly the same atmospheric and celestial heavens as “heavens” does in Genesis 1:1. It also corresponds to the “new heaven(s)” of Isaiah 65:17, Isaiah 66:22, and 2 Peter 3:13. In Revelation 21:2 we see God’s dwelling place isn’t replaced but relocated when the New Jerusalem is brought down to the New Earth.

The new heavens will surely be superior to the old heavens, which themselves are filled with untold billions of stars and perhaps trillions of planets. God’s light casts the shadows we know as stars, the lesser lights that point to God’s substance. As the source is greater than the tributary, God, the Light, is infinitely greater than those little light-bearers we know as stars.

The Bible’s final two chapters make clear that every aspect of the new creation will be greater than the old. Just as the present Jerusalem isn’t nearly as great as the New Jerusalem, no part of the present creation—including the earth and the celestial heavens—is as great as it will be in the new creation.

While some passages suggest that the universe will wear out and the stars will be destroyed, others indicate that the stars will exist forever (Psalm 148:3-6). Is this a contradiction? No. We too will be destroyed by death, yet we will last forever. The earth will be destroyed in God’s judgment, yet it will last forever. In exactly the same way, the stars will be destroyed, yet they will last forever. Based on the redemptive work of Christ, God will resurrect them.

Earth is the first domain of mankind’s stewardship, but it is not the only domain. Because the whole universe fell under mankind’s sin, we can conclude that the whole universe was intended to be under mankind’s dominion. If so, then the entire new universe will be ours to travel to, inhabit, and rule—to God’s glory.

Do I seriously believe the new heavens will include new galaxies, planets, moons, white dwarf stars, neutron stars, black holes, and quasars? Yes. The fact that they are part of the first universe and that God called them “very good” means they will be part of the resurrected universe. When I look at the Horsehead Nebula and ask myself what it’s like there, I think that one day I’ll know. Just as I believe this “self-same body”—as the Westminster Confession put it—will be raised and the “self-same” Earth will be raised, I believe the “self-same” Horsehead Nebula will be raised. Why? Because as part of the present heavens, it will be raised as part of the new heavens.

Will the new planets be mere ornaments, or does God intend for us to reach them one day? Even under the Curse, we’ve been able to explore the moon, and we have the technology to land on Mars. What will we be able to accomplish for God’s glory when we have resurrected minds, unlimited resources, complete scientific cooperation, and no more death? Will the far reaches of our galaxy be within reach? And what about other galaxies, which are plentiful as blades of grass in a meadow? We will expand the borders of righteous mankind’s Christ-centered dominion, not as conquerors who seize what belongs to others, but as faithful stewards who will occupy and manage the full extent of God’s physical creation.

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Contentment Is the True Measure of Godliness

This Black Friday, it’s worth reminding ourselves that we are living in an era when we have more material possessions than any generation before us. Compared to Americans living in the 1950s, we have countless more conveniences, including big-screen TVs, microwaves, online shopping, smartphones, and twice as many cars. It’s easy to assume our purchases will automatically lead to greater contentment.

But will they? Dr. David G. Myers claims that this generation is actually less content than generations before it. “Compared with their grandparents, today’s young adults have grown up with much more affluence, slightly less happiness and much greater risk of depression and assorted social pathology.”

The false idea that prosperity brings contentment is nothing new. Paul warned Timothy and the church at Ephesus about false teachers—first-century equivalents to modern prosperity theology proponents—who were “depraved in mind and deprived of the truth, imagining that godliness is a means of gain” (1 Timothy 6:5).

Like the Pharisees, these false teachers were religious braggarts, and most of what Scripture says about the one group applies to the other. Jesus put it this way: “Everything they do is just to show off in front of others” (Matthew 23:5, CEV). They impressed people with their clever interpretations and personality-driven communication. Instead of faithfully teaching God’s Word, they misused their platform to perform and make money. We know from historical documents that some prominent religious teachers in that time charged exorbitant speaker fees. Like their counterparts today, they embraced the secular culture’s materialistic values while baptizing them with verses taken out of context.

Many people believed such preachers were wealthy because God approved of them. But He didn’t then, and He doesn’t today.

After describing the false teachers as “imagining that godliness is a means of gain,” Paul immediately followed with “but godliness with contentment is great gain” (1 Timothy 6:6).

Like the Pharisees, the false teachers used superficial, outward godliness as a means to the ends of popularity, power, and wealth. Paul, however, wasn’t talking about a show of godliness. He was referring to genuine, inward godliness centered on the person and work of Jesus Christ. This is a humble godliness that manifests itself as a natural outflow, never as a calculated performance.

The New Living Translation renders 1 Timothy 6:5-6 this way: “To them, a show of godliness is just a way to become wealthy. Yet true godliness with contentment is itself great wealth” (emphasis added). When it comes to lasting gain, true godliness definitely pays off! But the measure of such godliness is our contentment, not our bank balance. And that is the great gain.

Excerpted from Randy's book Giving Is the Good Life . Also see more resources on money and giving. 

Photo by Simona Sergi on Unsplash

Praise and Gratitude, Even in Affliction

To the arrogant I say, “Boast no more,”
and to the wicked, “Do not lift up your horns.
Do not lift your horns against heaven;
do not speak with outstretched neck.”
No one from the east or the west
or from the desert can exalt a man.
But it is God who judges:
He brings one down, he exalts another.
In the hand of the Lord is a cup
full of foaming wine mixed with spices;
he pours it out, and all the wicked of the earth
drink it down to its very dregs.
As for me, I will declare this forever;
I will sing praise to the God of Jacob.
—Psalm 75:4–9

God is the Almighty Judge who brings one person down while exalting another with purposes and timing that only He understands. His creatures may respond to His mysterious ways with bitterness, indifference, or praise. Given these alternatives, I choose praise.

Puritan pastor Richard Baxter wrote, “Resolve to spend most of your time in thanksgiving and praising God. If you cannot do it with the joy that you should, yet do it as you can.… Doing it as you can is the way to be able to do it better. Thanksgiving stirreth up thankfulness in the heart.”

Baxter is right—expressing praise and gratitude makes a grateful heart. Gratitude is a perspective-shaping habit, especially in difficult times.

Charles Spurgeon wrote, “I venture to say that the greatest earthly blessing that God can give to any of us is health, with the possible exception of sickness.… If some men that I know of could only be favoured with a month of rheumatism, it would, by God’s grace, mellow them marvelously.”

Though he sought to avoid suffering, Spurgeon said, “I am afraid that all the grace that I have got of my comfortable and easy times and happy hours, might almost lie on a penny. But the good that I have received from my sorrows, and pains, and griefs, is altogether incalculable.… Affliction is the best bit of furniture in my house. It is the best book in a minister’s library.”

You may think, I refuse to accept that suffering can prove worthwhile. But your rejection of God’s goodness will not make you better or happier; it will only bring resentment and greater pain. Accept health as God’s blessing and its absence as God’s severe mercy. Samuel Rutherford wrote these profound words in the seventeenth century:

If God had told me some time ago that he was about to make me as happy as I could be in this world, and then had told me that he should begin by crippling me in arm or limb, and removing me from all my usual sources of enjoyment, I should have thought it a very strange mode of accomplishing his purpose. And yet, how is his wisdom manifest even in this! For if you should see a man shut up in a closed room, idolizing a set of lamps and rejoicing in their light, and you wished to make him truly happy, you would begin by blowing out all his lamps; and then throw open the shutters to let in the light of heaven.

Father, when we like what is happening, gratitude comes more naturally, though even then we take far too much for granted. But when we do not understand your purposes, praise is an act of humble submission learned only through the experience of trials. Given the alternatives of bitterness, indifference, and praise, may we always choose to praise you. For whether or not we see your hand in all that is happening to us, you remain worthy of our praise. Someday, in retrospect, we, your children, will wonder how we ever could have doubted, how we ever could have failed to speak your praises. Give us today the same perspective we’ll have one minute after we die.

Excerpted from Randy's book  90 Days of God's Goodness. 

Photo by Rainier Ridao on Unsplash

God Invites Us into His Happiness

In my book Happiness, I assert that modern Christians need to speak more, not less, about happiness—the kind of happiness that’s centered on Christ.

Francis of Assisi (1181–1226) said, “Let us leave sadness to the devil and his angels. As for us, what can we be but rejoicing and glad?”

I talked with a young woman who viewed the Christian life as one of utter dullness. She knew that following Christ was the right thing to do, but she was certain it would mean sacrificing her happiness.

Unless her view changes dramatically, her spiritual future is bleak. It isn’t in our nature to continually say no to what we believe would make us happy—or to say yes to something that would make us unhappy. (Don’t mistake perseverance for choosing unhappiness—the man who faithfully loves his wife suffering from dementia is not choosing unhappiness but rather choosing the happiness of honoring his wife, keeping his vows, and hearing God’s “well done.”)

So where did this young woman, who was raised in a fine Christian family and church, acquire such an unbiblical notion? What are we doing—what are we missing—that leaves many of our children and our churches laboring under such false impressions? Why do we think it would be unspiritual for the Christian life to be centered on what God calls the good news of happiness?

Celebration and gladness of heart have characterized the church, including the suffering church, throughout history. Scripturally, the culture of God’s people is one of joy, happiness, gratitude, eating and drinking, singing and dancing, and making music. It’s not the people who know God who have reason to be miserable—it’s those who don’t.

When our face to the world is one of anger, misery, shame, cowardice, or defensiveness, the gospel we speak of doesn’t appear to be the good news of happiness. And we shouldn’t be surprised if people, both outside and inside the church, aren’t attracted to it. Why should they be?

Joy and laughter should be the church’s norm, not the exception.

Children who grow up seeing church as a morose, hypercritical place will turn their backs on it in their quest for happiness. Those who have found happiness in the church will usually stay or return.

Sadly, many non-Christian young adults today view Christ’s followers as “hypocritical,” “insensitive,” and “judgmental.” These words all describe unhappy people. (If the world judges us, so be it, but it shouldn’t be because we’re chronically unhappy.)

It seems to me there are two extremes of Christians when it comes to happiness. Some change the channel from the coverage of a hurricane, refuse to think about sex trafficking and abortion, and ignore the sufferings of this world while grabbing on to superficial living. They look the other way when their marriages are in trouble or when their children choose wrong friends, yet they keep claiming Jesus’ promise of easy lives without suffering. (Never mind that Jesus never made such a promise!)

Other Christians are perpetually somber, never laughing or poking fun at themselves, rarely celebrating, and quick to frown when they see someone having fun. Shoulders sagging, they believe that happiness is ungodliness.

The Bible presents a more balanced perspective. Paul said he was “sorrowful, yet always rejoicing” (2 Corinthians 6:10). Sorrow and joy can and do coexist, for now. (Note that the “always” in this verse is applied to rejoicing, not being sorrowful.)

If we constantly focus on all that’s wrong with the world, then sorrow or anger will be our default. But the apostle Paul, writing from prison in Rome, calls on us to rejoice in the Lord not periodically, but always.

It’s not insensitive, unkind, or wrong to be happy. By being happy in Christ, we lay claim to the fact that God is bigger than the Fall and affirm that our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will reverse the Curse and reign over a new universe. Our happiness shouts that our God is present with us and at work in the world every minute of every hour of every day. The narrower our view of God’s presence in this world—and in our daily lives—the less happiness we’ll experience.

Scripture’s good news is of “great joy,” not “great duty.”

Mike Mason writes, “No one would become a Christian if this hard decision were not accompanied by stupendous joy.”

The Puritans, never accused of being trendy, talked a great deal about Christian happiness. Scottish theologian Samuel Rutherford (1600–1661) wrote to Lady Kenmure, “I have neither tongue nor pen to express to you the happiness of such as are in Christ.”

Baptist pastor Octavius Winslow (1808–1878) said, “The child of God is, from necessity, a joyful man. His sins are forgiven, his soul is justified, his person is adopted, his trials are blessings, his conflicts are victories, his death is immortality, his future is a heaven of inconceivable, unthought-of, untold, and endless blessedness—with such a God, such a Saviour, and such a hope, is he not, ought he not, to be a joyful man?” It was a rhetorical question—who could possibly have more reason to rejoice than one who knows Jesus?

When the gospel is viewed primarily as laying burdens and obligations on people, the Good News gets buried. Burdens and obligations are not good news; good news is about liberation, deliverance, newfound delight, and daily celebration. Sure, duty is real and the gospel calls us to a life of obedience, but it’s glad duty and joyful obedience.

There’s an age-old tradition of Christ-followers who have found their deepest happiness in their Lord. We should eagerly join them and say with English Puritan John Flavel (1627–1691), “Christ [is] the very essence of all delights and pleasures, the very soul and substance of them. As all the rivers are gathered into the ocean . . . so Christ is that ocean in which all true delights and pleasures meet.”

Growing in our happiness in Christ is a process.

The bride of Christ matures incrementally. As we “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18), we grow in joy.

Paul depicted the gradual process of growth in Christlikeness this way: “We all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:18, niv). With ever-increasing glory comes ever-increasing happiness in our Lord. Sin loses its hold on us—largely because we see the misery it brings. We begin to ask ourselves, “How could I believe for a moment that sin could bring me happiness?”

We also learn from adversity. When our perspective and our faith are put to the test, our happiness can flourish. That’s why so many passages surprise us by connecting rejoicing with trials (see James 1:2-4; 1 Peter 1:6-9; 2 Corinthians 8:2-3; Hebrews 10:34).

Our pursuit of genuine happiness in God honors Him.

When Puritan Jonathan Edwards was only nineteen years old, he made a resolution that speaks volumes: “Resolved, to endeavor to obtain for myself as much happiness in the other world as I possibly can, with all the power, might, vigour, and vehemence . . . I am capable of.”

Like most of the Puritans, Richard Sibbes did not demean the quest for happiness; rather, he saw Jesus as the proper object of that quest: “Only to a true Christian, by a supernatural light, is discovered both the right object, and the right way to felicity.”

In the movie The Stepford Wives, husbands program “perfect” wives. Of course, these robotic wives are perfect only in the sense that they do whatever their husbands want. But what any good man really desires is a relationship with a real person who responds out of heartfelt love and happiness. Fake, programmed love or happiness is empty—in fact, it’s unreal.

C. S. Lewis said, “The happiness which God designs for His higher creatures is the happiness of being freely, voluntarily united to Him and to each other in an ecstasy of love and delight compared with which the most rapturous love between a man and a woman on this earth is mere milk and water.”

God doesn’t force happiness on us. He invites us to enter His happiness and find it in Him.

Excerpted from Randy's book Happiness. Browse more resources on the topic of happiness, and see his other related books, including  Does God Want Us to Be Happy?

Photo by Christin Noelle on Unsplash

Helping Give Children Access to Clean Water Is an Eternal Investment

Jesus, in Matthew 10:42, makes a startlingly significant promise about a seemingly small act of service: “And whoever gives one of these little ones even a cup of cold water because he is a disciple, truly, I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward."

In that verse, Jesus is referring to His apostles as "these little ones." And later, in Matthew 25:31-46 Jesus broadens His statement about “I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink” to "whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me” (v. 40). Surely the principle involved extends to children and the neediest of our fellow humans.

Jesus had a very special love for children:

“At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, ‘Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?’ He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me’” (Matthew 18:1-5, NIV).

He also said these remarkable words about His disciples, and once again the principle naturally extends to all children, in particular those who love Jesus:

“See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in Heaven" (Matthew 18:10).

In this video you will meet Luci, a sister in Christ in another part of the world where her life—and those of “the least of these” in her community—radically changed due to the accessibility of fresh water through Water Mission, an organization I truly believe in.

If our love is genuine, when we see the picture, or hear the story of a thirsty child, we don’t just feel bad for the moment or merely think, I wish that child weren’t thirsty. Love finds a way to help that child or children like her. Love means giving.

John Wesley spoke of the good our generous giving can do:

In the hands of [God’s] children, it is food for the hungry, drink for the thirsty, raiment for the naked. It gives to the traveler and the stranger where to lay his head. By it we may supply the place of a husband to the widow, and of a father to the fatherless. We may be a defence for the oppressed, a means of health to the sick, of ease to them that are in pain. It may be as eyes to the blind, as feet to the lame: yea, a lifter up from the gates of death!

The truth is, if you and your children are not malnourished or enslaved, and if you can access clean water and shelter, you are relatively rich—on that basis alone. The next time you’re tempted to think, I don’t have enough money to give, don’t compare yourself to the relatively small number of people who have more than you. Compare yourself to the seven billion others who have less—most of them far less.

Contrast your investment in “the least of these” with buying an RV, a larger TV, or a high-end vacation, or putting more money into an already ample retirement plan. It’s not that those things are inherently bad; simply consider their temporal nature and the longer lasting, and so eternally beautiful impact of money given to reach the unreached, get clean water to a remote village, feed hungry children, or educate young people so they can get good jobs and thrive.

“Your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost” (Matthew 18:14).

I encourage you to send the gift of life to needy people created in God’s image, and for whom Christ died, including children and their parents who are laboring to keep them alive. You can give directly to Water Mission, or if you prefer, you can give to EPM's relief fund (choose "relief fund" under the "select fund" dropdown) and through Friday, December 9, we will direct 100% of your donation to Water Mission.