The Works of God

Martyn Lloyd-Jones has been dead for more than 20 years.  I am really glad he wrote books and recorded sermons!

And I appreciate this reminder – we can go to Jesus with anything.

I do not care what it is that makes you restless and ill at ease. It may be the possibility of war, it may be illness, it may be business troubles, it may be your own weakness morally in the realm of the will – whatever it is, whatever is troubling and making you unhappy, go to him about it.  He is the one who loved you enough to die for you.  He said, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).

Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled, p. 27.

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Joni gave a great interview with Tabletalk Magazine for their October edition, Dealing with Death and Disease.  You can read the entire interview here: A Purpose in the Pain: An Interview with Joni Eareckson Tada.

Here is an excerpt (paragraph formatting is mine):

TT: Which passages of Scripture have given you encouragement during your struggles with disability and cancer?

JT: Psalm 79:8 says, “May your mercy come quickly to meet us, for we are in desperate need” (NIV).

Basically, I wake up almost every morning in desperate need of Jesus — from those early days when I first got out of the hospital, to over four decades in a wheelchair, it’s still the same. The morning dawns and I realize: “Lord, I don’t have the strength to go on. I have no resources. I can’t ‘do’ another day of quadriplegia, but I can do all things through You who strengthen me. So please give me Your smile for the day; I need You urgently.”

This, I have found, is the secret to my joy and contentment. Every morning, my disability — and, most recently, my battle with cancer — forces me to come to the Lord Jesus in empty-handed spiritual poverty. But that’s a good place to be because Jesus says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 5:3, NIV).

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Someday, no more disability.  But God clearly uses disability to keep us oriented to and dependent on him.

And someday, no more death.  But Albert Martin, in his new book, helpfully points out that even our last enemy, death, is used by God for his glory and our good in this present age:

Left to ourselves, we become careless in the duty of numbering our days. We so easily drift into living as though we will be here on this earth forever. . . Few things more quickly and effectively snap some of the shackles that bind us to this world than does the death of a dearly loved one. Tenderly, holding their lifeless form in our arms, or wistfully looking as they lie in a coffin, such experiences become powerful voices. These voices call out, urging us to obtain the wisdom that alone can enable us to live as those who “number our days.”

Albert Martin, Grieving, Hope and Solace: When a Loved One Dies in Christ, pp. 95-96.

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Burk Parsons is the editor of Tabletalk Magazine, produced by Ligonier Ministries.  This quote is taken from his recent article, Death, Disease and the Gospel:

Because of the unrelenting nature of death and disease, we might be tempted to try to run from death and hide from disease while striving with all our might never to think on such matters. But in doing so our striving would not only be vain but sinful. Just as the Puritans spoke of dying well, so we need to be reminded that it is not a question of if and when we will die, but how we will die and how we will cope with the daily realities of death and disease — will we stand and shake our fists at God in bitter anger or will we kneel in prayer and in humble dependence on our Lord and on the promises of the gospel of Jesus Christ by the sustaining power of the Holy Spirit, glorifying God and enjoying Him now and at the hour of our death? For the Lord gives, and the Lord takes away — blessed be the name of the Lord (Job 1).

You can read the entire article from Ligonier’s website here.

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I deeply appreciate Ray Ortland’s blog; he marries beautiful paintings and pictures with words of truth.

His blog yesterday, Sight or blindness?, included an image I actually didn’t like all that much – which is unusual – but the text made me stop to worship!

I’ve included it here in its entirety:

“The prophecies, the very miracles and proofs of our religion, are not of such a nature that they can be said to be absolutely convincing.  But they are also of such a kind that it cannot be said that it is unreasonable to believe them.  Thus there is both evidence and obscurity to enlighten some and confuse others.”

Pascal, Pensées, 8.564.

The Bible is closed to those who are blind, and there are none so blind as those confident in their own understanding.  The Bible is open to those are are open, and there are none so open as those desperate in their need.

To the former, the Bible will be constantly offering up further evidences against itself, and they gloat over it.  To the latter, the Bible will be constantly offering up further evidences against themselves, but they don’t mind, because they see their Savior too.

In both cases, how people experience the Bible reveals the truth about themselves.  But no one defeats the Bible.

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When Christ is so precious and so satisfying to you that you can count all other things as rubbish by comparison, then weaknesses and insults and hardships and persecutions and calamities cannot touch the core of your contentment.

John Piper, speaking to Desiring God’s Philippian Fellowship, September 23, 2011

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Thank you to Jan Lacher for pointing me to this article by Elizabeth Elliot.

I deeply appreciate Elizabeth Elliot, and this article written in 1989, There Are No Accidents, Says Judy, just adds to my regard for her.  She is writing and quoting her friend, Judy Squier, a woman born without legs.

Some of the words in this article would be considered old-fashioned, but it is worth reading.  It is also very short!

Here’s a sample:

What we judge to be ‘tragic – the most dreaded thing that could happen,’ I expect we’ll one day see as the awesome reason for the beauty and uniqueness of our life and our family.

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I had lunch with some new friends on Tuesday who have an incredible story about their son’s first few days of life – and the resulting disability.

Their combined response: God is good.  In hard things, God is good.  In things that could have been prevented if they had just lived somewhere else, God is good and he is sovereign.  No bitterness, just great seriousness about God.  And both are happy people.

They are pouring their lives into the work of God’s church.  They make God look REALLY big and REALLY glorious!

Pastor John talked about people like that in What Jesus Demands from the World (emphases in bold are mine):

It is a joy that is meek and merciful and pure and peaceable, but these things alone do not awaken people to the glory of God. In order to waken people to consider God as an explanation for our good works there generally must be an obstacle of suffering that would ordinarily cause them to be angry or despairing, but does not have that effect on us. Rather they see us “rejoice” in hardship. They see that this hardship does not make us self-centered and self-pitying and mean-spirited. Instead they see our joy and wonder what we are hoping in when ordinary props for hope have been knocked away. The answer, Jesus says, is that we have great reward in heaven (Matt. 5:12). That is, Jesus has become a treasure for us that is more precious than what the world offers. Therefore, when persecution or calamity take natural pleasures away, we still have Jesus, and we still have joy.  John Piper, What Jesus Demands from the World, p. 358.

I walked away from lunch very encouraged – and wanting to make much of Jesus like that!

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He did not die to make this life easy for us or prosperous. He died to remove every obstacle to our everlasting joy in making much of him. And he calls us to follow him in his sufferings because this life of joyful suffering for Jesus’ sake (Matt. 5:12) shows that he is more valuable than all the earthly rewards that the world lives for (Matt. 13:44; 6:19-20). If you follow Jesus only because he makes life easy now, it will look to the world as though you really love what they love, and Jesus just happens to provide it for you. But if you suffer with Jesus in the pathway of love because he is your supreme treasure, then it will be apparent to the world that your heart is set on a different fortune than theirs. This is why Jesus demands that we deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow him.

John Piper, What Jesus Demands from the World, p. 71

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