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Because Jesus rose, “we will see him and touch him and marvel at him forever!”

April 8, 2012 by John Knight

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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Satan rightly sings his song of accusation. But he forgot the refrain!

April 7, 2012 by John Knight

The song is Embracing Accusation by Shane and Shane.

The sermon clip in this video came from Pastor John’s sermon, Command of God: The Obedience of Faith delivered December 3, 2006.

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An amazing portrayal of Good Friday

April 6, 2012 by John Knight

Much thanks to Igniter Media for posting The Last Painting.

The Last Painting can also be accessed by clicking here.

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Here we go! Desiring God Conference – The Works of God: God’s Good Design in Disability

April 5, 2012 by John Knight

I was grabbing lunch and checked twitter and there it was: the first announcement of Desiring God’s disability conference on November 8.

And tears immediately came to my eyes, and prayers of gratitude.

I’ll have a lot more to say about it later.

The next three days should be focused on our Jesus and what he did in obedience to the Father that resulted in extraordinary, unbelievable, unimaginable good for us!   Sunday is coming!

In the meantime, I hope you will join me in praying for this conference and for your own participation in it.

Posted in News, Special Events | 4 Comments »

Have no doubt, Jesus understands your sorrow

April 5, 2012 by John Knight

Surely he has borne our griefs
   and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
  smitten by God, and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our transgressions;
    he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
     and with his wounds we are healed.
All we like sheep have gone astray;
    we have turned—every one—to his own way;
and the Lord has laid on him
    the iniquity of us all.

He was oppressed, and he was afflicted,
     yet he opened not his mouth;
like a lamb that is led to the slaughter,
    and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent,
    so he opened not his mouth.
By oppression and judgment he was taken away;
    and as for his generation, who considered
that he was cut off out of the land of the living,
    stricken for the transgression of my people?
And they made his grave with the wicked
     and with a rich man in his death,
although he had done no violence,
    and there was no deceit in his mouth.

Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him;
    he has put him to grief;
when his soul makes an offering for guilt,
    he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days;
the will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand.
Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied;
     by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant,
     make many to be accounted righteous,
     and he shall bear their iniquities.
Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many,
     and he shall divide the spoil with the strong,
     because he poured out his soul to death
    and was numbered with the transgressors;
yet he bore the sin of many,
    and makes intercession for the transgressors.

Isaiah 53:4-12

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Jesus knows everything, including the mind of a boy with autism

April 4, 2012 by John Knight

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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This is what love looks like

April 3, 2012 by John Knight

By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. (1 John 3:16 ESV)

This fellow is Bob Horning.  The little girl belongs to Kempton and Caryn Turner.  Bob and Mary were taking care of the Turner children on Saturday.

It does not appear to be a duty for either Bob or Carysse, does it!  Yet Bob is fully attending to his duties as protector and caretaker.  Carysse was fully attending to her duties of being cared for!

Bob and Mary’s oldest child, Krista, was born with many complications due to her disabilities.  Kempton and Caryn’s oldest child, Christian, was born prematurely and also lives with many complications from his disabilities.  So it is safe to say that disability brought these families together.

And then Jesus knit together their hearts.

Most of the parents I know (including me) who unexpectedly entered this life of disability never imagined that this life could also include the joys of affection and friendship – particularly when those joys come because of disability, not in spite of it.  Yet the experience of deep sorrow also opens the way for hearts to connect in unusual, joy-filled ways.

And the rest of us get to see a glimpse in a little girl happily attending church with two people who love her very much while her parents are away.

God is always doing 10,000 more things than we can begin to see or imagine, for his glory and for our good.

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We are not the first generation who needed to protect the babies with disabilities

April 2, 2012 by John Knight

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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Now that’s a way to put a wedding together!

April 1, 2012 by John Knight

God-centered weddings are so encouraging!  Dianne and I attended one yesterday.

It was beautifully done.  And they looked directly at suffering and God’s goodness.  Yes, at a wedding!

The young couple chose well for their Scripture readings, including Isaiah 43:1-7:

But now thus says the LORD, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel:

“Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.

When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,and the flame shall not consume you.

For I am the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.

I give Egypt as your ransom, Cush and Seba in exchange for you.

Because you are precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you, I give men in return for you, peoples in exchange for your life.

Fear not, for I am with you; I will bring your offspring from the east, and from the west I will gather you.

I will say to the north, Give up, and to the south, Do not withhold; bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the end of the earth, everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made.” (Isaiah 43:1-7 ESV)

They are right; we will go through the deep waters and fire of suffering.

But we are known intimately!  We have been created and formed by God – and so have our children with disabilities.  And we’ve been created, all of us, for God’s glory!

Their choice of hymn also prepared us: How Firm a Foundation

  1. How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
    Is laid for your faith in His excellent word!
    What more can He say than to you He hath said—
    To you who for refuge to Jesus have fled?
  2. “Fear not, I am with thee, oh, be not dismayed,
    For I am thy God, and will still give thee aid;
    I’ll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,
    Upheld by My gracious, omnipotent hand.
  3. “When through the deep waters I call thee to go,
    The rivers of sorrow shall not overflow;
    For I will be with thee thy trouble to bless,
    And sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.
  4. “When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie,
    My grace, all-sufficient, shall be thy supply;
    The flame shall not harm thee; I only design
    Thy dross to consume and thy gold to refine.
  5. “The soul that on Jesus doth lean for repose,
    I will not, I will not, desert to his foes;
    That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,
    I’ll never, no never, no never forsake.”

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“All things exist out of Him and for Him.” A. W. Tozer

March 31, 2012 by John Knight

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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