The Study of our Sovereign God

 

God’s Word compels us to “come unto Him” and to “grow in the grace of knowledge of Christ” and as we at Theology Girls embark in 2010 on new studies, we are  once reminded again why this important.  I thought this a good occasion to repost my original post to Theology Girls as a refresher-reminder as to go forward.  I pray that it will encourage you to “come unto Him” and grow, worship, praise and adore your Sovereign God and Savior.  ~~tolle lege~~

 

“The LORD hath prepared His throne in the heavens; and His kingdom ruleth over all.” Psalm 103:19

Why study theology? In our past studies, one of the most compelling and important books we studied was A.W. Pink’s book, “The Sovereignty of God.” This book is about the Absolute Sovereign God of the universe. It is a book about the study of God (theology) and doctrine. The question was asked, “Why do we need to study and understand this doctrine?” In answer to that question, I shared some of my reasons for our study of this most profound and God-glorifying doctrine and the importance of why we must study it and the negative consequences if we do not.

My first answer would be that if one does not know who God is in His absolute sovereignty, then they are unable to understand or make heads or tails out of God’s Word and thus they are disabled in their ability to live the Christian life as commanded in Scripture. Understanding God’s sovereignty thus enables believers to apply practically what they know theologically to their Christian life.

Secondly, they are denied the peace that Christ gives that passes understanding because they are tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine. They are insecure because of their inability to understand the why and wherefore of life, and to know who is ruling all of Creation. Understanding God’s sovereignty gives stability, soundness of faith and peace to heart and life. It answers the questions of life.

Thirdly, they have no understanding of the God of salvation and of God’s providence and plan for redemption for His people. Thus, they have a God that cannot save or keep those whom He has redeemed. The result of their lack of knowledge is an erroneous works-motivated, works-related salvation or, as some would say, no salvation at all. Understanding God’s sovereignty increases faith and trust in God alone and His predeterminate counsel and wisdom in salvation from eternity past to eternity future.

Fourthly, they do not have the understanding to teach and train others and thus fulfill their responsibilities as Christians in their homes and in society. Understanding God’s sovereignty equips the saints with the tool[s] necessary to teach, train and disciple God’s people to live a life that is “pleasing” to Christ.

We, as Reformed women, understand the importance of doctrine in the Christian life and how that without understanding doctrine, it is impossible to understand and practically work out how we must live and serve Christ in this present world. Thus, we know that “doctrine” or the “theology” of what we believe is important as foundational to understanding the Christian life. This is why Reformed believers study the Bible, the confessions and creeds and why we train our children in Bible and catechism memorization. It is so that we have a firm and biblical foundation of understanding so that we can “rightly” apply the Scriptures in a “daily” and “practical” way in our lives. Thus, we are seeking to be a reflection of God’s glory “daily” as we live out the Christian life.

Christ tells us in Proverbs 9:10: “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.” That means that we are to “know” God in His fullness and when we do, we will have “understanding.” The Bible is God’s “revealed” will and word to us so that we can gain this understanding and for us to truly “know” Him as He is. God has also given us good pastors, teachers and books to help us in this understanding. We are additionally commanded in 2 Timothy 2:15 to “Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” Thus, we must study and be educated believers in God’s doctrines.

I am reminded of Dr. Philip Ryken’s admonition that women are “commanded to learn Christ” and that “every Christian woman is called to be a theologian.” In other words, we are commanded to “know” Christ and to truly know Him, we must study about Him. Theology is the study of God. We read this book by Pink and we read and study other sound, biblical theologians and enjoy their works of diligence in understanding this doctrine. We have great tools to help us “grow in grace and knowledge.” May we learn in great humility of mind and submission to His Word and be truly “women of the Book” as we serve our Mighty God and Saviour in the role He has for us. My prayer for this study is that He alone receives all glory, honor and praise and that we grow more in faithfulness and thankfulness for such a great salvation that He has freely given to us.

“Which in his times He shall shew, who is the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords; Who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see: to whom be honour and power everlasting. Amen.” I Timothy 6:15-16

Living Coram Deo,
Theology Girl
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“Heavenly Notes”

“Why Are You Cast down?”

 

“Heavenly Notes”
Title: Why Are You Cast down?
Author: Martin Luther

“Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted in me? hope thou in God: for I shall yet praise Him  for the help of His countenance.”  

God deals strangely with His saints, contrary to all human wisdom and understanding, to the end, that those who fear God and are good Christians, may learn to depend on invisible things, and through mortification may be made alive again; for God’s Word is a light that shines in a dark place, as all examples of faith show. Esau was accursed, yet it went well with him; he was lord in the land, and priest in the church; but Jacob had to fly, and dwell in poverty, in another country.

God deals with godly Christians much as with the ungodly, yea, and sometimes far worse. He deals with them even as a house-father with a son and a servant; He whips and beats the son much more and oftener than the servant, yet, nevertheless, He gathers for the son a treasure to inherit, while a stubborn and a disobedient servant He beats not with the rod, but thrusts out of doors, and gives him nothing of the inheritance.  

It is often asked: Why desperate wretches have such good days, and live a long time in jollity and pleasure, to their heart’s desire, with health of body, fine children, etc., while God allows the godly to remain in calamity, danger, anguish and want all their lives; yea, and some to die also in misery, as St. John the Baptist did, who was the greatest saint on earth, to say nothing of our only Saviour Jesus Christ. The prophets have all written much hereof, and shown how the godly should overcome such doubts, and comfort themselves against them. Jeremiah says, “Why goeth it so well with the ungodly, and wherefore are all they happy that deal very treacherously?” But further on, “Thou sufferest them to go at liberty like sheep that are to be slain, and thou preparest them for the day of slaughter.” Read also Psalms xxxvii., xlix., lxxiii.

God is not therefore angry with His children, though He scourge and punish them; but He is angry with the ungodly that do not acknowledge Christ to be the Son of God, and the Saviour of the world, but blaspheme and condemn the Word; such are to expect no grace and help of Him. And, indeed, He does not Himself scourge and beat His small and poor flock that depend on Christ; but suffers them to be chastened and beaten, when they become ever secure and unthankful unto Him for His unspeakable graces and benefits shown unto them in Christ, and are disobedient to His Word; then permits He that the devil bruise our heels, and send pestilence and other plagues unto us; and that tyrants persecute us, and this for our good, that thereby we may be moved, and in a manner forced to turn ourselves unto Him, to call upon Him, to seek help and comfort from Him, through Christ.

* * *

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“Heavenly Notes”  

 

Growing in Grace Studies: CONSECRATION Pt. 2

GROWING IN GRACE STUDIES
Blogging with TheologyGirl & ReformedWomen
January 2010
BOOK: The Deeper Christian Life by Andrew Murray

 

CONSECRATION Pt.2

“But who am I, and what is my people, that we should be able to offer so willingly after this sort? For all things come of Thee, and of Thine own have we given Thee.”

 3. If God gives all and I receive all, then the third thought is very
   simple– I must give all back again. What a privilege that for the sake
   of having me in loving, grateful intercourse with Him, and giving me
   the happiness of pleasing and serving Him, the Everlasting God should
   say, “Come now, and bring Me back all that I give.” And yet people say,
   “Oh, but must I give everything back? Brother, don’t you know that
   there is no happiness or blessedness except in giving to God! David
   felt it. He said: “Lord, what an unspeakable privilege it is to be
   allowed to give that back to Thee which is Thine own!” Just to receive
   and then to render back in love to Him as God, what He gives. Do you
   know what God needs you for? People say, “Does not God give us all good
   gifts to enjoy?” But do you know that the reality of the enjoyment is
   in the giving back? Just look at Jesus–God gave Him a wonderful body.
   He kept it holy and gave it as a sacrifice to God. This is the beauty
   of having a body. God has given you a soul; this is the beauty of
   having a soul–you can give it back to God. People talk about the
   difficulty they meet with in having so strong a will. You never can
   have too strong a will, but the trouble is we do not give that strong
   will up to God, to make it a vessel in which God can and will pour His
   Spirit, so as to fit it to do splendid service for Himself.

   We have now had the three thoughts: God gives all; I receive all; I
   give up all. Will you do this now? Will not every heart say, “My God,
   teach me to give up everything?” Take your head, your mind with all its
   power of speaking, your property, your heart with its affections–the
   best and most secret–take gold and silver, everything, and lay it at
   God’s feet and say, “Lord, here is the covenant between me and Thee.
   Thou delightest to give all, and I delight to give back all.” God teach
   us that. If that simple lesson were learnt, there would be an end of so
   much trouble about finding out the Will of God, and an end of all our
   holding back, for it would be written, not upon our foreheads, but
   across our hearts, “God can do with me what He pleases; I belong to Him
   with all I have.” Instead of always saying to God, “Give, give, give,”
   we should say, “Yes, Lord, Thou dost give, thou dost love to give, and
   I love to give back.” Try that life and find out if it is not the very
   highest life.

   4. God gives all, I receive all, I give all. Now comes the fourth
   thought: God does so rejoice in what we give to Him. It is not only I
   that am the receiver and the giver, but God is the Giver and the
   Receiver too, and, may I say it with reverence, has more pleasure in
   the receiving back than even in giving. With our little faith we often
   think they come back to God again all defiled. God says, “No, they come
   back beautiful and glorified”; the surrender of the dear child of His,
   with his aspirations and thanksgivings, brings it to God with a new
   value and beauty. Ah! Child of God you do not know how precious the
   gift that you bring to your Father, is in His sight. Have I not seen a
   mother give a piece of cake, and the child comes and offers her a piece
   to share it with her? How she values the gift! And your God, oh, my
   friends, your God, His heart, His Father’s heart of love, longs, longs,
   longs to have you give Him everything. It is not a demand. It is a
   demand, but it is not a demand of a hard Master, it is the call of a
   loving Father, who knows that every gift you bring to God will bind you
   closer to Himself, and every surrender you make will open your heart
   wider to get more of his spiritual gifts. Oh, friends! A gift to God
   has in His sight infinite value. It delights Him. He sees of the
   travail of His soul and is satisfied. And it brings unspeakable
   blessing to you. These are the thoughts our text suggests; now comes
   the practical application. What are the lessons? We here learn what the
   true dispositions of the Christian life are.

   To be and abide in continual dependence upon God. Become nothing, begin
   to understand that you are nothing but an earthen vessel into which God
   will shine down the treasure of His love. Blessed is the man who knows
   what it is to be nothing, to be just an empty vessel meet for God’s
   use. Work, the Apostle says, for it is God who worketh in you to will
   and to do. Brethren, come and take tonight the place of deep, deep
   dependence on God. And then take the place of child-like trust and
   expectancy. Count upon your God to do for you everything that you can
   desire of Him. Honour God as a God who gives liberally. Honour God and
   believe that He asks nothing from you but what he is going first to
   give. And then come praise and surrender and consecration. Praise Him
   for it! Let every sacrifice to Him be a thank-offering. What are we
   going to consecrate? First of all our lives. There are perhaps men and
   women–young men and women–whose hearts are asking, “What do you want
   me to do–to say I will be a missionary?” No, indeed, I do not ask you
   to do this. Deal with God, and come to Him and say, “Lord of all, I
   belong to Thee, I am absolutely at Thy disposal.” Yield up yourselves.
   There may be many who cannot go as Missionaries, but oh, come, give up
   yourselves to God all the same to be consecrated to the work of His
   Kingdom. Let us bow down before Him. Let us give Him all our
   powers–our head to think for His Kingdom, our heart to go out in love
   for men, and however feeble you may be, come and say: “Lord, here I am,
   to live and die for Thy Kingdom. Some talk and pray about the filling
   of the Holy Spirit. Let them pray more and believe more. But remember
   the Holy Spirit came to fit men to be messengers of the Kingdom, and
   you cannot expect to be filled with the Spirit unless you want to live
   for Christ’s Kingdom. You cannot expect all the love and peace and joy
   of heaven to come into your life and be your treasures, unless you give
   them up absolutely to the Kingdom of God, and posses and use them only
   for Him. It is the soul utterly given up to God that will receive in
   its emptying the fullness of the Holy Spirit. Dear friends we must
   consecrate not only ourselves–body and soul–but all we have. Some of
   you may have children; perhaps you have an only child, and you dread
   the very idea of letting it go. Take care, take care; God deserves your
   confidence, your love, and your surrender. I plead with you; take your
   children and say to Jesus: “Anything Lord, that pleases Thee.” Educate
   your children for Jesus. God help you to do it. He may not accept all
   of them, but He will accept of the will, and there will be a rich
   blessing in your soul for it. Then there is money. When I hear appeals
   for money from every Society; when I hear calculations as to what the
   Christians of England are spending on pleasure, and the small amount
   given for Missions, I say there is something terrible in it. God’s
   children with so much wealth and comfort, and giving away so small a
   portion! God be praised for every exception! But there are many who
   give but very little, who never so give that it costs them something,
   and they feel it. Oh, friends! Our giving must be in proportion to
   God’s giving. He gives you all. Let us take it up in our Consecration
   prayer: “Lord, take it all, every penny I possess. It is all Thine.”
   Let us often say “It is all His.” You may not know how much you ought
   to give. Give up all, put everything in His hands, and He will teach
   you if you will wait.

   We have heard this precious message from David’s mouth. We Christians
   of the nineteenth century, have we learned to know our God who is
   willing to give everything? God help us to.

   And then the second message. We have nothing that we do not receive,
   and we may receive everything if we are willing to stand before God and
   take it.

   Thirdly. Whatever you have received from God give it back. It brings a
   double blessing to your own soul.

   Fourthly. Whatever God receives back from us comes to Him in Heaven and
   gives Him infinite joy and happiness, as he sees His object has been
   attained. Let us come in the spirit of David, with the spirit of Jesus
   Christ in us. Let us pray our Consecration Prayer. And may the Blessed
   Spirit give each of us grace to think and to say the right thing, and
   to do what shall be pleasing in the Father’s sight.

Growing in Grace Studies: CONSECRATION Pt. 1

GROWING IN GRACE STUDIES
Blogging with TheologyGirl & ReformedWomen
January 2010
BOOK: The Deeper Christian Life by Andrew Murray

 

CONSECRATION

“But who am I, and what is my people, that we should be able to offer  so willingly after this sort? For all things come of Thee, and of Thine own have we given Thee.”

To be able to offer anything to God is a perfect mystery. Consecration is a miracle of grace. “All things come of Thee, and of  Thine own have we given Thee.”  In these words there are four very precious thoughts I want to try and make clear to you: -

   1. God is the Owner of all, and gives all to us.

   2. We have nothing but what we receive–but everything we need we may receive from God.

   3. It is our privilege and honour to give back to God what we receive from Him.

   4. God has a double joy in His possessions when he receives back from us what He gave.

And when I apply this to my life–to my body, to my wealth, property, to my whole being with all its powers–then I understand what Consecration ought to be.

1. It is the glory of God, and His very nature, to be always GIVING.   God is the owner of all. There is no power, no riches, no goodness, no  love, outside of God. It is the very nature of God that He does not live for Himself, but for His creatures. His is a love that always delights to give. Here we come to the first step in consecration. I must see that everything I have is given by Him; I must learn to believe in God as the great Owner and Giver of all. Let me hold that fast. I have nothing but what actually and definitely belongs to God.  Just as much as people say, “this money in my purse belongs to me,” so God is the Proprietor of all. It is His and His only. And it is His life and delight to be always giving. Oh, take that precious thought–there is nothing that God has that He does not want to give. It is His nature, and therefore when God asks you anything, He must give it first Himself, and He will. Never be afraid whatever God asks; for God only asks what is His own; what He asks you to give He will first Himself give you. The Possessor, and Owner, and Giver of all! This is our God.  You can apply this to yourself and your powers to all you are and have. Study it, believe it, live in it, every day, every hour, every moment.

2. Just as it is the nature and glory of God to be always giving, it is  the nature and glory of man to be always receiving. What did God make us for? We have been made to be each of us a vessel into which God can pour out His life, His beauty, His happiness, His love. We are created to be each a receptacle and a reservoir of divine heavenly life and blessing, just as much as God can put into us. Have we understood this, that our great work–the object of our creation–is to be always receiving? If we fully enter into this, it will teach some precious things. One thing–the utter folly of being proud or conceited. What an idea! Suppose I were to borrow a very beautiful dress, and walk about boasting of it as if it were my own, you might say, “What a fool!” And here it is the Everlasting God owns everything we have; shall we dare to exalt ourselves on account of what is all His? Then what a blessed lesson it will teach us of what our position is! I have to do with a God whose nature is to be always giving, and mine to be always    receiving. Just as the lock and key fit each other, God the Giver and I the receiver fit into each other. How often we trouble about things, and about praying for them, instead of going back to the root of things, and saying, “Lord, I only crave to be the receptacle of what the Will of God means for me; of the power and the gifts and the love and Spirit of God.” What can be more simple? Come as a receptacle –cleansed, emptied and humble. Come, and then God will delight to give. If I may with reverence say it, He cannot help Himself; it is His promise, His nature. The blessing is ever flowing out of Him. You know how water always flows into the lowest places. If we would but be emptied and low, nothing but receptacles, what a blessed life we could live! Day by day just praising Him–Thou givest and I accept. Thou bestowest and I rejoice to receive. How many tens of thousands of  people have said this morning: “What a beautiful day! Let us throw open  the windows and bring in the sunlight with its warmth and  cheerfulness!” May our hearts learn every moment to drink in the light and sunshine of God’s love.

Next week:  CONSECRATION Pt. 2