The Works of God

A glad word on the risen Christ from Pastor John!  Paragraph formatting and emphasis in bold are mine.

The risen Christ who reigns in heaven today and intercedes for us with the Father is a rejected stone! He has flesh and bones! He is one of us. And this truth contains good news for now and good news for later. For now it means this:

We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sinning. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. (Hebrews 4:15–16)

For he too is a rejected stone with pierced hands and flesh and bone!

But not only that. This truth is also good news for the future.

Get every ethereal, ghost-like conception of the coming kingdom out of your head. The God-man is not going to rule over invisible spirits and ghosts. “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies.”

We will eat broiled fish in the kingdom! We will hold it in our physical hands and stand on our feet.

And there will be no more wheel chairs or crutches or cancer or paralysis or leukemia or allergies or arthritis any more.

For we will bear the image of the Son of God, and we will see him and touch him and marvel at him forever and ever, because the divine stone which is now at the head of the corner is the very same human stone that was once rejected.

From The Marvelous Rising of a Rejected Stone delivered by Pastor John Piper, March 30, 1986

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April is National Autism Awareness Month. 

Out of all of our son’s multiple disabilities, autism reigns over them all in terms of complicating his life, and ours.  The blindness, the seizures, the eating and sleeping issues – everything – would be easier if he could communicate with us and we with him.

But there is hope.  Jesus is never caught by surprise:

There is no one who perplexes Jesus. No thought or action is unintelligible to him. He knows its origin and end. The most convoluted psychotic and the most abstruse genius are open and laid bare to his understanding. He understands every motion of every mind.

John Piper, Seeing and Savoring Jesus Christ, p. 52.

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Infanticide may be widespread in a society or happen only occasionally, but it has few, if any, exceptions with one class of infants, that is, deformed infants.

Laila Williamson as quoted in Infanticide and the Handicapped Newborn, edited by Dennis Horan and Melinda Delahoyde, p. 3.

As you can see, one thing has changed significantly in the 30 years since this book was written.  We rarely speak of infants as ‘deformed’ any longer, and the word handicapped has also been replaced by other words.

But the war against our babies with disabilities continues, just as it has for centuries. We must persevere.

And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. (Galatians 6:9 ESV)

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Back of all, above all, before all is God; first in sequential order, above in rank and station, exalted in dignity and honor. As the self-existent One He gave being to all things, and all things exist out of Him and for Him. “Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.”

Every soul belongs to God and exists by His pleasure. God being Who and What He is, and we being who and what we are, the only thinkable relation between us is one of full lordship on His part and complete submission on ours. We owe Him every honor that it is in our power to give Him.

A. W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God (pp. 66-67). Kindle Edition.

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You’d think I would know Don’t Waste Your Cancer existed as an online book, but I just discovered it on Tuesday.

I highly recommend it.

From the Preface by Pastor John:

I originally wrote this on the eve of prostate-cancer surgery. I believed then, and I believe now, in God’s power to heal—by miracle and by medicine. I believe it is right and good to pray for both kinds of healing. Cancer is not  wasted when it is healed by God. He gets the glory, and  that is why cancer exists. So not to pray for healing may  waste our cancer.

But healing is not God’s plan for everyone in this life. And there are many other ways to waste our cancer. As I prayed for myself, and continue to do so, I also pray for you that we will not waste this pain.

John Piper, Don’t Waste Your Cancer, p. 3.

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Hear the words of Jesus: “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death,” (Mark 14:34) and let them draw you closer to him.

Have you always wanted to be closer to Jesus? I know you wouldn’t have chosen this method to get there. We wish we could get closer to Jesus by saying a prayer, going to a Bible study, reading a book, or in some other convenient and controllable way. But the truth is, it’s uniquely through our own sorrow that we can draw close to the Man of Sorrows.

Nancy Guthrie, Hearing Jesus Speak into Your Sorrow (p. 5). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. Kindle Edition.

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Paul Tautges is a pastor, a writer, a blogger, and a NANC certified counselor.

He’s also the father of 10, four of whom live with disabilities. I’m glad to know him!

He wrote this on Friday at his blog, Counseling One Another, and I found it helpful:

In moments of anxiety, panic, and dread of both the known and unknown, where do you turn, who do you cry out to for help? Personally, I have found no better remedy than that of repeating the words of the frightened psalmists. Praying back to our great God and patient Savior the words of the divinely-inspired prayer book—the Psalms—soothes my soul as truth corrects my focus and feeds my feeble, wavering faith. Here’s an example of one I have prayed through many times. May it calm your heart as its truth produces reigning peace.

Make haste, O God, to deliver me! O LORD, make haste to help me! Let them be put to shame and confusion who seek my life! Let them be turned back and brought to dishonor who desire my hurt! Let them turn back because of their shame who say, “Aha, Aha!” May all who seek you rejoice and be glad in you! May those who love your salvation say evermore, “God is great!” But I am poor and needy; hasten to me, O God! You are my help and my deliverer; O LORD, do not delay!  (Psalm 70)

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I missed World Down Syndrome Day again.  It is always March 21, which represents the three copies of chromosome 21 (3/21 – get it?) that is unique to people with Down syndrome.

But my friend, Justin Reimer, didn’t forget and had a good word for World Down Syndrome Day from his own experience with his oldest son Eli:

(D)isability is prominent but not primary in our family. Meaning that disability is obviously in our midst, but Jesus is primary to our existence as individuals, a family, and the Body of Christ. A real mercy to us has been seeing (his children’s) childlike understanding that our sovereign, gracious, and all-powerful God has intended Down Syndrome for our good and God’s glory. We know that we have a long way to go in our parenting, but it has been a great encouragement to see that disability has not served as a wedge between our children and the character of God. No, far from it. Down Syndrome, and disability in general, has been more of a fulcrum with a lever gloriously weighted towards the goodness of God manifest even in the most broken of lives.

So on this day our family stands blessed, changed, and more like Jesus (with a long ways to go) in part because he knit Eli together in his mother’s womb with Down Syndrome. Thank you, Jesus!

Justin Reimer, Executive Director, The Elisha Foundation on World Down Syndrome Day, March 21, 2012

May we all feel the glorious weight of the goodness of God today!

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