Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”
(Luke 23:34)

Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?”—which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
(Matthew 27:46)

Today, Good Friday, we celebrate God’s wrath appeased.

Christ was put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith (Romans 3:25). In this propitiation, he did not merely deflect the righteous wrath of God… he absorbed it— and absorbed it fully—on our behalf. And “it was to show hisrighteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.” (Romans 3:26)

This is what he did for us. And this is what we remember and celebrate today on Good Friday.

Oh, how deep the Father’s love for us!

When it comes to supposed contradictions in the Bible, a classic example is Paul vs. James on the subject of justification. Paul says, “For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law” (Romans 3:28). James says, “You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone” (James 2:24).

The tension between the two seems irreconcilable at first glance: either a person is justified apart from works or they aren’t; either Paul is right or James is. They can’t both be right; that would be irrational, postmodern thinking in which truth is relative and, therefore, meaningless. But not necessarily. We have to remember that a single word can have more than one meaning, depending on the context in which it is used. The same word can even be used in seemingly opposing statements and yet both can still be true. (My favorite example is “cleave,” a word that has two directly opposed meanings.)

(Read the rest)

(written by Mark Dodd)

“For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”
Romans 5:10-11

Grace lovers everywhere, hear this: God’s grace brings about obedience. Not only that, but our joy is wrapped up in this divinely empowered obedience. Indeed, it is a sweet and praise-worthy thing that we are not condemned by our sin, but there is something even sweeter—namely, we are free to enjoy our God.

Look at the progression here in Romans 5:10-11. We start with the glorious fact that we were reconciled to God while we were His enemies. What’s interesting is the start of the next phrase: “much more.” What could possibly be  sweeter than being reconciled to God when we were enemies? What could be sweeter than this salvation? Not only did Christ’s death reconcile us, but what’s more is that His life will save us. We have been reconciled to God, and Christ is the living God, who is right now interceding for the saints and faithfully saving us out of sin and into faithfulness.

But this is not the end! We have at the beginning of verse 11 the phrase “More than that.” Even more than being saved by His life, we are saved into rejoicing in God through Jesus Christ. The one leads to the other. This is the foremost position of the grace of God in a Christian’s life. Through Christ, we are enabled—because of our reconciliation and salvation—to rejoice in God!

This is the kind of God we have. Our greatest command, and the end of all that God has done for us is that we would get to obey God by experiencing supreme enjoyment of our supremely good God. Praise be to Him!

(by Dustin Smetona)

One of God’s most important qualities—especially for sinners like us—is His forgetfulness. Where would we be if God were not a forgetful God?

Our Unintentional Forgetfulness

We use the word forget to refer to something we lose track of unintentionally. In 3rd grade I competed in a spelling bee at the new school I had started attending that year. In the later rounds as the numbers were whittling down, I was starting to feel confident that I might be able to win. I came up to the mic and the judge said, “Please spell the word forgetful.” I began to spell, “F-R…” and immediately stopped as the auditorium erupted in laughter. I was devastated and embarrassed, but I’m better now. That mental spasm demonstrates precisely what we mean when we say “forget.” We don’t typically desire to forget things, but we do because of our lack of capacity to remember.

God’s Intentional Forgetfulness

God, on the other hand, only forgets when He intends to. This is because His capacity to remember is infinite. He can’t forget anything! That is, of course, unless He means to.

So if God can only forget on purpose, what does He forget? Consider the following three verses:

Isaiah 43:25
“I, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.”

Jeremiah 31:34
“And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”

Ezekiel 33:16
“None of the sins that he has committed shall be remembered against him. He has done what is just and right; he shall surely live.”

The only thing that God willfully forgets is sin. But how does He actually do that? If His capacity to remember is infinite and infallible, how can He make something disappear from His memory?

He does not magically wish our sins away. Instead, He “remembered” your sins on Christ, and as a result He “remembers” Christ’s righteousness on you! This forgetful act on our behalf is the supreme display of His abundant love. It is incalculably wonderful to consider and to savor.

Heading into 2012

Since we are at the very beginning of a new year, I’m convinced this truth has special significance. I don’t know what 2011 was like for you. My guess is that there were some monumental achievements and some crushing defeats. If you are beginning 2012 with any guilt from sins committed this past year, I hope you will embrace the gospel again and be renewed. God has removed 2011′s sins “as far as the east is from the west” (Ps. 103:12) and you have complete assurance of that reality because they were nailed to the cross back in the 1st century. Find freedom, joy, and comfort knowing that God delights in you as a father does his precious child. His plans for your this year are for His glory and your good. Trust your loving, forgetful God as you move ahead into 2012.

Are you busy here and there, or have you discovered what He wants you to do and are staying focused and faithful on that? …As I scan the church leadership landscape today, I have come to the conclusion that busyness has not gotten better but worse…but with His help and grace, it doesn’t have to continue.
—Dave Kraft (source)

What is a surprisingly difficult task for some pastors to do with their wives?

Brian Croft writes:

As I talk to pastors and aspiring ones about why this is a struggle, there seems to be a universal answer, “I do not know why it is hard to do, it just is.”  I am sympathetic to this answer as there was a time where I experienced this same awkward, intangible, uneasiness in approaching my wife to pray for her with her.  I think there is an intimacy and vulnerability in a husband’s effort to care for his wife in this way that is uncomfortable for most men and pastors fall prey to this also.

FREE Online Course: Theology of the Reformers

BiblicalTraining.org has added a new class to their lineup of free courses. The class is titled Theology of the Reformers and is taught by Timothy George.

TGC: Top 10 Most Read Articles of 2011

10. What Does It Look Like to Receive the New Testament for the First Time?
9. Twitter Slander
8. It Was Not Wicked for the Lord to Take Our Son
7. Grieving, Rejoicing that Osama bin Laden Is Dead
6. Why Youth Stay in Church When They Grow Up
5. Pray for Sayed Musa: Afghan Christian Set to Be Hanged within Days?
4. Dude, Where’s Your Bride?
3. Beware Romantic Pornography
2. Parenting 001
1. Rob Bell: Universalist? / God Is Still Holy and What You Learned in Sunday School Is Still True: A Review of ‘Love Wins’ / Two Thoughts on the Rob Bell Brouhaha / To Hell with Hell / MSNBC: Martin Bashir’s Interview with Rob Bell

(Click through to read Collin Hansen’s synposis of each)

TGC VIDEO: Bad Art and the Tortured Beauty of the Cross

The rise of younger Christians embracing the arts is encouraging to observe!

“Bad art encourages escapism among Christians. Good art, epitomized by the Psalms, helps us long for the new creation even as we learn to love all God’s creatures.”

VIDEO: Frontline Missions International

I’ve heard this passage preached two ways: (1) The first ways says that it’s all about accepting licentiousness, in a don’t-judge-others kind of way. (2) The second way says not to pronounce judgment on someone else’s sin. However, it’s about neither one of these.

So, which is it?

The first way focuses in on verse 1, “judge not, that you be not judged,” but ignores verse 5, “then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.” If this is Christ’s message, then we ought to ignore the sin of others, hoping that our own sin will be likewise forgotten by God. The second approach does the opposite, thus exegeting the text in such a way that verse 1 is essentially negated. Though I am guilty, as many, of interpreting Scripture in a way that causes it to be in a battle with itself, I hope to shed some light on this text that shows verse 1 and verse 5 as different angles to the same point. I hope that my brothers and sisters will be kind enough to do the same for me when I am doing this elsewhere in Scripture.

In Christ, away with sin!

The problem with the typical dichotomy that is placed on this Scripture is that both extremes leave sin in the equation. One has us allowing sin, and the other has us condemning it. Christ, however, is speaking of iron humbly sharpening iron in such a way that, rather than bondage to sin, there is deliverance and freedom. Christ takes issue not with believers sanctifying one another, but with the odd brand of delight in evil that comes when one sinner points out error in another sinner for no other reason than to show that he is right and the other is wrong. The gospel is not a thing that is content to go about pointing out wickedness simply for the sake of argument. The gospel doesn’t just point out sin, it drives out sin. John says it this way:

“For God did not send His son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him.”
John 3:17

It’s about holiness

Therefore, it should not be our desire that people be judged. It should be our desire that people be saved, and by being saved become holy. Just as we do not want ourselves to be judged, we ought not to want others to be judged either.

This is proven by verse 5, when the first man does not simply point out the speck in his brother’s eye, he removes the plank from his own, and then takes the speck out of the other’s. At the end of this story there is no license to sin, and there is no judgment upon others. There is merely holiness—wonderful holiness—brought about by grace and love.

Thanks be to the God of all grace. Amen.

Enjoy the turkey, family, and friends!