Satisfied???

"The critical question for our generation—and for every generation—
is this: If you could have heaven, with no sickness, and with all the
friends you ever had on earth, and all the food you ever liked, and
all the leisure activities you ever enjoyed, and all the natural beauties
you ever saw, all the physical pleasures you ever tasted, and no
human conflict or any natural disasters, could you be satisfied with
heaven, if Christ were not there?" John Piper - God Is The Gospel

The Gospel Lived Out In The Family

"Children growing up in a Christian home should actually be able to see the Gospel modeled in the way their father loves their mother with a sacrificial love, the love of Jesus for His church, and the way the mother submits to the father as an expression of the church's submission to the Lordship of Christ." - Alistair Begg

Now For Something Completely Different

One of my friends from high school is very involved in the start-up of a brand new company. The company's name is Alice , because after all, everyone needs an Alice. At least that's what their company slogan says. To be honest I'm not exactly sure how the company will work, but it is my understanding that consumers will be able to purchase household cleaning items, personal hygiene items, and other things and have them delivered to your home all with free shipping.

Now anyone who knows anything about our family knows that we love good deals. So our curiosity is peaked. Well, yesterday, to spread the word about the company, Alice offered up a freebie to anyone who posts about them on their blog. Which brings us to this.

Free Toilet Paper. For A Year.

Now who couldn't use that? I encourage you, no, I implore you to go and enter for yourself. If for no other reason, do it so that one day in one of those conversations when someone asks you if you have ever won anything you will be able to say, "I won a years worth of toilet paper." Now that's a conversation starter.
Contest ends Saturday, June 6 at midnight.

Do Right

Recently, our oldest son, Alex, was presented with an opportunity that would provide him with a lot more freedom than he had experienced before. This of course provided Mom and Dad with some concerns, but we gave our o.k. and permitted him to go. I thought about what I wanted to say to him before he went. In fact I thought about it a lot. Do I threaten him with the "if you do this" or do I ignore the multiple scenarios running through my mind? After all, it doesn't seem like that long ago when I was a teenage boy and I know what I would have done with the same level of freedom. As I thought about it, I decided to take the middle road. I left the threats and situations behind and instead gave him the following council. I don't believe that it is original to me, but I don't remember who said it. Anyway, this is what I told him as I was dropping him off.

"Alex, do right. Don't be good. Being good is situational. Just do right. Do right because it is right to do right." I think someone should walk up to me many times and say the same thing to me.

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Now playing: Sovereign Grace Music - Oh the Deep, Deep Love
via FoxyTunes

Death is Not Dying

This is more than a suggestion. Go here and watch the video or download the audio. A tremendous God-centered presentation of the Gospel. (Thanks to Kerry for passing this along)

Now I Wear His Righteousness

'My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? Why are You so far from helping Me, and from the words of My groaning?' (Ps 22:1)

'So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place of a skull, which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha' (John 19:17)

Where were those who had followed him? Where were his disciples? Surely one of them would come to his aid and help him bear his cross. But no, for the Scriptures had stated long before, 'Strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered' (Zech. 13:17).

No disciples to aid him. No angel to strengthen him as there had been in the garden. At Bethlehem, when the Saviour was born, the night was changed to day as the glory of the Lord shone around the shepherds. On Golgotha the day gave way to night as Christ sank deeper and deeper into the abyss of damnation. At Bethlehem there were countless angels praising God; on Golgotha legions of darkness filled the impenetrable gloom, hoping that darkness would finally triumph over light. Heaven was silent.

Christ felt both the hurt of man's injustice and the weight of God's justice as he went forth to bear the full curse of sin and so to be accursed of God. He was to die on a cross and 'cursed is every one that is hanged on a tree' (Gal. 3:13). Matthew Henry comments, 'Those that see him thus hang between heaven and earth will conclude him abandoned of both and unworthy of either'.

Christ became a 'curse for us'. He bore our sin and its consequences, even the curse of a holy God. He was treated as if he were a sinner. God's curse is intrinsically holy. It is his condemnation of sin and the sinner. Christ as sin-bearer was inevitably accursed of God. Just as blessing reaches its fullness in heaven, so the curse reaches it fullness in hell, and Christ experienced the curse in its fullness.

He 'took the curse upon Himself in order that He might satisfy us with His blessing'. While it is true that 'He came to preach the Gospel, His chief object in coming was that there might be a Gospel to preach'.

Now, the forgiven, restored sinner willingly takes up his cross and follows the Lord Jesus Christ. That cross is whatever the Christian suffers for the sake of Christ and his truth. In bearing that cross there is peace and blessedness as the Christian experiences the fellowship of Christ's sufferings. Not that we can share in the redemptive suffering of Christ, but rather that we seek by God's grace to deny self, accept the anguish of the struggle against sin and bear meekly the scorn of a world that rejects Christ. 'There are some who would have Christ cheap. They would have Him without the cross. But the price will not come down'.

The hand that reaches out for salvation must be empty. Everything of self must be disowned. We are debtors to mercy alone. We are all beggars. - Taken from The Cross He Bore, by Frederick Leahy

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Now playing: Aaron Keyes - Not Guilty Anymore
via FoxyTunes

Three On Thursday

Here are three random things I have learned in the last week.

• In 1996, these mummies were discovered in Egypt. I found it somewhat fascinating because people had been virtually living on top of the tombs for years and didn't know they existed. They were only discovered when a donkey tripped and knocked a hole into the roof with its hoof.

• If your doctor tells you that you need to lower your cholesterol, do not, under any circumstances, mention that fact within earshot of your children. They will not allow you to eat anything for the rest of your life. Actual quote, "You," said one sibling to the other, "May have as many sticky buns as you would like. Dad can't have any because his cholesterol is too high."

• I am constantly reminded that surrender is not a daily event in a victorious Christian's life, rather it is moment by moment. Col 3:3 "For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God." For someone who has died to sin, it is far to active in my life to be called dead. Yet I take hope in knowing that His grace is sufficient in this also. I have been purchased by His blood, therefore my life is hid in Christ, my Savior and my God.
  

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Now playing: Sara Groves - The Long Defeat
via FoxyTunes