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Read this book and participate in ‘table talks’ with Pastor John

March 26, 2011 by John Knight

After more than 26 years of being associated with Bethlehem, I can say that Pastor John’s preaching has been his primary influence on me.  But a close second are his books.  And of his books, Desiring God: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist lays the foundation for all the rest that are to come.

Through April 7, you can buy a copy of the newest edition of Desiring God for only $5.

A live-streamed web broadcast will take place every Thursday in April at noon (live Eastern Standard Time, rebroadcast at noon during Central, Mountain and Pacific Times), where Pastor John will take questions on two chapters of Desiring God.

Reading the Bible and seeing God as sovereign and good has been massively important in my life in how I understand and respond to disability and disease.  And God has also used Pastor John to help me when he speaks or writes specifically on the issue of suffering:

For (the Apostle Paul) any suffering that befell him while serving Christ was part of the “cost” of discipleship.  When a missionary’s child gets diarrhea, we think of this as part of the price of faithfulness.  But if any parent is walking in the path of obedience to God’s calling, it is the same price.  What turns sufferings into sufferings “with” and “for” Christ is not how intentional our enemies are, but how faithful we are.  If we are Christ’s, then what befalls us is for his glory and for our good whether it is caused by enzymes or by enemies (emphasis mine). John Piper, Desiring God, p. 260.

If the notion of Christian hedonism just seems strange (or even blasphemous) to you, buy the book, read the first two chapters of Desiring God and join in the live-streamed discussion on April 7.  You might think about God’s interest in your happiness in an entirely new way.

You can also read an earlier edition of Desiring God online for free.

Posted in Book Commentary, Special Events | Leave a Comment »

Thanking God for a life well lived

March 25, 2011 by John Knight

Thank you to Justin Taylor, who posted this announcement on his blog on Thursday:

Harvard Law Professor William Stuntz died last week at the age of 52 after suffering from colon cancer. Both pieces in The New York Times refer to his strong Christian faith. Professor Stuntz developed a distinctly Christian perspective on his field of expertise and in so doing became “one of the most influential legal scholars of the past generation.”

Justin quotes Dr. Stuntz from a Christianity Today article from 2009:

Our pain is not empty; we do not suffer in vain. When life strikes hard blows, what we do has value. Our God sees it.

Justin also provides links to an interview with Timothy Darymple and to the article Dr. Stuntz wrote for Christianity Today.  The interview is, in some ways, very difficult to read for its raw emotion, and Dr. Stuntz had a great way with words which adds to the impact of the suffering he is describing.

But the interview ends on this wonderful note:

The concept that God longs for the likes of me is so unspeakably sweet.  I almost cannot bear to say them aloud.  They are achingly sweet for me to hear.

Thank you, Justin, for pointing to this life well lived.

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The sad history of the United States Supreme Court

March 24, 2011 by John Knight

I’ve mentioned the bio-ethicist Peter Singer before, and his arguments to kill infants with disabilities.

Members of the Supreme Court of the United States have also held such views about people with disabilities.

Paul Lombardo’s horrifying history of a case brought before the Supreme Court, Buck v. Bell, includes this statement from Oliver Wendel Holmes, Jr., Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, 1902 – 1932:

As I have said, no doubt, often, it seems to me that all society rests on the death of men.  If you don’t kill ’em one way you kill ’em another – or prevent their being born.

Lombardo goes on to say:

He had no compunctions about ‘restricting propagation by the undesirables and putting to death infants that didn’t pass examination.’  Lombardo, p. 165

For a season the eugenics movement in the United States had the backing of the Supreme Court, powerful members of congress, a couple of United States presidents, influential philanthropists, university professors, scientists, and even members of the clergy.

That season is gone.  The organizations that grew up out of that movement, like Planned Parenthood, have needed to entirely change their message to continue to exist.

May it be so for this evil season of abortion as well.

Posted in Book Commentary, commentary | 2 Comments »

Pray without ceasing. . . for our pastors

March 23, 2011 by John Knight

After Paul had his ‘spell’ in church on Sunday, we made our way up to the sanctuary and needed to sit in the balcony.

The first thing I saw – five leaders who I love:  Pastor John, Pastor Sam, Pastor David standing together; Pastor Kempton across the aisle with his bride, Caryn; and Pastor Chuck leading worship in song.

There is a reason why we were so well served in Paul’s class: God’s continued supply of God-centered, service-oriented leadership.  Every one of those five men have been required to do hard things in their service to the church.  Yet that constancy of clinging to God permeates the place, and results in volunteers who do hard things to love on families like ours.

Earlier in the week I had lunch with one of our younger pastors – who is attempting to do hard things with the strength and wisdom God provides.  And I had lunch with two pastors of a different church who had just come through a very difficult set of circumstances.  And God provided help in some spectacular ways.

Those of us parenting children with disabilities are trained by all the systems we combat to be advocates – and sometimes our advocacy behavior spills over into the church in ways that aren’t very pretty.

But on Sunday as I looked at those five men, I could testify to their steadfastness in clinging to Jesus and pursuing the good of their people.

So, just a reminder – pray for your pastor.  We ask a great deal from them.

Posted in commentary | 3 Comments »

Disability and the evangelical bubble

March 22, 2011 by John Knight

Pastor John started his sermon on John 8 this past Sunday by talking about the evangelical bubble we can find ourselves in.  It isn’t a bad place to be – it includes all the people who believe what we believe, and love what we love and talk about things we like to talk about.

Frankly, that’s one of the reasons I like my church so much.

He went on to say that there are people out there, hundreds and hundreds of leaders in churches and universities, who don’t believe what we believe.  And they make statements about God’s word that are shocking to those of us who live in this bubble.  Pastor John offered a couple of examples, including quoting a professor from Duke University.

He was right. His examples were shocking.

But they weren’t surprising to me.

Disability has forced me to engage certain ‘religious’ sectors that I never would have known existed.  For example, more than a decade ago I attended a conference on disability and the church and heard a Jewish Rabbi respond to a question about how to deal with the ‘hard’ passages in the Bible on disability.  This Rabbi assumed Leviticus 21 was being referenced in the question.  He very seriously responded that “we just ignore those passages; we know better now.”

I had NEVER heard anything like that before. Yet the general response in that crowd wasn’t the confusion and disappointment I was feeling, but a general sense that he was right.

But it didn’t have the effect I think that Rabbi was intending.  Rather than settle the question, or make me retreat into the bubble, God gave me a very keen interest in the subject of disability and the Bible.  Since that conference, I have read hundreds of journal articles on the Bible and disability.  Most shock me in how breezily they dismiss aspects of God’s word, his character or his authority.  Some of the arguments are just silly, but because they are ‘novel’ or ‘cutting edge’ they get a serious reading in otherwise serious journals.

It has had the impact of making me read the Bible much more carefully, and to ask, regularly, for the Holy Spirit’s help in understanding what I am reading.

I count that as a good thing.

If we have an interest in disability and the Bible, we will run into horrible arguments.  We’ve dealt with those issues a few times in this forum:

So, I’m glad for that evangelical bubble.  I like reading books from my ‘tribe’ and I like going to church and I like reading blogs by men like Justin Taylor and Kevin DeYoung and Tim Challies.

But it isn’t for the purpose of living in that bubble, but to get ready for what I know is out there.  And that’s where Jesus is, outside the camp (Hebrews 13:13).

Posted in commentary, Sermons | 1 Comment »

Why you put your best people in children’s ministry

March 21, 2011 by John Knight

On Sunday morning it was almost one of ‘those’ days.  But we pushed through together and made it to church on time.

About two minutes after dropping Paul off, he had one of his seizure-like episodes.  We hadn’t even made it out of the hallway up to the sanctuary.

But, rather than giving up, the room leader (who I also happen to know through her volunteering at Desiring God) just wanted to make sure it was ok for him to stay.  These episodes are frightening to watch, but she knew that a significant part of her job is helping families like mine experience worship and preaching.

After these spells, Paul mostly wants to sleep, so he wasn’t going to be demanding much attention.  And Paul’s aid is both an experienced health care professional and a long-term volunteer with him.

So, the rest of us went up to worship.

We were late by this time, but we were in the sanctuary.  We were in the sanctuary because the children’s ministry is oriented toward serving the children AND their families.  And sometimes families are best served when a child with multiple disabilities who has an unknown seizure-like disorder sleeps on his volunteer’s lap.

Posted in commentary, Helpful things | 3 Comments »

God creates AND governs all things!

March 20, 2011 by John Knight

I’m watching thousands of geese head north as I write this.  It is an amazing sight; their flight pattern is distinct and beautiful and very complicated as I watch individual birds within the mass. I went outside and could hear multitudes of birds twittering, singing and honking.  It is good for my soul.

A.W. Pink, The Sovereignty of God, p. 110.

God created all things.

This truth no one, who bows to the testimony of Holy Writ, will question; nor would any such be prepared to argue that the work of creation was an accidental work.

God first formed the purpose to create, and then put forth the creative act in fulfillment of that purpose.

All real Christians will readily adopt the words of the Psalmist and say, “O Lord, how manifold are Thy works ! in wisdom has Thou made them all.”

Will any who endorse what we have just said, deny that God purposed to govern the world which He created?

Surely the creation of the world was not the end of God’s purpose concerning it.

Surely He did not determine simply to create the world and place man in it, and then leave both to their fortunes.

It must be apparent that God has some great end or ends in view, worthy of His infinite perfections, and that He is now governing the world so as to accomplish these ends – “The counsel of the Lord standeth for ever, the thoughts of His heart to all generations” (Ps 33:11).

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The world is in crisis, and God is not alarmed

March 19, 2011 by John Knight

I enjoy conferences for the new content I will hear explaining old truths, and for the old content I usually discover.

I bought A.W. Pink’s The Sovereignty of God at the Children Desiring God conference this past weekend.  Though it is not yet more than 100 years old (it was first published in 1930), I can say with confidence that Pink brings a helpful, God-centered wisdom that will last well into the future!

A.W. Pink, The Sovereignty of God, p. 15

Without a doubt a world crisis is at hand, and everywhere men are alarmed. But God is not! He is never taken by surprise.

It is no unexpected emergency which now confronts Him, for He is the One who “worketh all things after the counsel of His own will” (Eph 1:11). Hence, though the world is panic-stricken, the word to the believer is, “Fear not”! “All things” are subject to His immediate control: “all things” are moving in accord with His eternal purpose, and therefore, “all things” are “working together for good to them that love God, to them who are called according to His purpose.”

It must be so, for “of Him, and through Him, and to Him are all things” (Rom. 11:36). Yet how little is this realized today even by the people of God! Many suppose that He is little more than a far-distant Spectator, taking no immediate hand in the affairs of earth.

It is true that man has a will, but so also has God. It is true that man is endowed with power, but God is all-powerful. It is true that, speaking generally, the material world is regulated by law, but behind that law is the law-Giver and the law-Administrator. Man is but the creature.

God is the Creator, and endless ages before man first saw the light “the Mighty God” (Isa. 9:6) existed, and ere the world was founded, made His plans; and being infinite in power and man only finite, His purpose and plan cannot be withstood or thwarted by the creatures of His own hands.

 

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All Means All! – Amy Carmichael

March 18, 2011 by John Knight

All the paths of the Lord are loving and faithful. Psalm 25:10

All does not mean “all – except the paths I am walking in now,” or “nearly all – except this especially difficult and painful path.” All must mean all.

So, your path with its unexplained sorrow or turmoil, and mine with its sharp flints and briers- and both our paths, with their unexplained perplexity, their sheer mystery – they are His paths, on which He will show himself loving and faithful.  Nothing else; nothing less.

Amy Carmichael, You Are My Hiding Place, p. 98

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“He will keep us at ease” – Oswald Chambers

March 17, 2011 by John Knight

If we are haunted by God, nothing else can get in, no cares, no tribulation, no anxieties. We see now why Our Lord so emphasized the sin of worry. How can we dare be so utterly unbelieving when God is round about us? To be haunted by God is to have an effective barricade against all the onslaughts of the enemy.

“His soul shall dwell at ease.” In tribulation, misunderstanding, slander, in the midst of all these things, if our life is hid with Christ in God, He will keep us at ease. We rob ourselves of the marvelous revelation of this abiding companionship of God. “God is our Refuge” — nothing can come through that shelter.

Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest, June 2 meditation.

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