Our singles event this month is on Saturday, February 28. We have the opportunity to participate again in a ministry called Bread of Life. Its main goals are to feed the poor and to share the gospel of Jesus with homeless people. You can find more information at the Bread of Life page.

Here are some reasons why it’s important for us to participate in this ministry:

• God is concerned with the poor. He gave commandments to make sure the poor had enough food (see Leviticus 19:9-10).
• Caring for the poor demonstrates our love for God (1 John 3:17; this verse primarily refers to the poor in the Church, I think, but we can also apply it to other poor people).
• Jesus became poor for us, so that we might become rich (2 Corinthians 8:9). Paul uses this as a motivation for the Corinthian church to give money to those in need. Giving to others is an ethical extension and illustration of the gospel.
• Jesus spent much of his time ministering to the poor. We follow in our Lord’s steps when we do the same.

I did a quick search for Bible verses on the poor, and found this page on the Bible and the poor. I never realized that the Bible talked so much about the poor and caring for the poor. Please look it over when you get a chance.

My heart here is for three things:

1. We glorify God when we care for the poor
2. The homeless people we’ll be feeding will benefit
3. This is a great opportunity to grow

The subtle love of comfort will often silently choke our spiritual growth. When we put this love to death by going to uncomfortable places, God often stretches us and grows our faith in ways that cannot happen through other means. I know that this is probably a scary outreach for many of you. Take heart, though–God’s promises to bless efforts like this are trustworthy! (Deuteronomy 15:10; Psalm 41:1) We serve a God who humbled Himself and became poor. He can help us in our anxiety and weakness and discomfort.

Tags: ethics, God, gospel, growth, homeless, outreach, poor, Sanctification, Scripture

I came to New Attitude 2008 with a tentative heart. The past year had been one of many changes in my life: moving back home after studying in England for four months, my sister getting married, moving in with her when my brother-in-law was deployed, then moving back in with my family after those 8 months, close friends leaving the church, and several other things weighing heavily on my heart that made me feel lost, forgotten, and just really unsure of what God was even doing in my life anymore.

I was excited about New Attitude, to get away from all of this confusion and to dive deep into God’s Word and learn how to better apply it to my life. I had been looking forward in particular to C.J. Mahaney’s message on “God’s Word and our Feelings” as I recognized that this troubled soul of mine needed to be addressed by Scripture. But in my pride, I was disappointed after that message, because I had heard it before, either from C.J.’s books or in other sermons. It wasn’t the “easy-one-step-solution-to-eradicating-your-feelings-of-depression” sermon that I guess I was hoping for.

But God mercifully did not leave me in my pride. At the end of the message, instead of individuals raising their hands, Joshua Harris had us pray in groups for everyone in the room. Here again, I was disappointed. “God, I know this is a good thing, to pray for others…but didn’t you have some sort of prophetic song for me, or something?” As I prayed, however, the Holy Spirit enabled me to get my eyes off of myself, and the words of truth that I prayed for others began to penetrate into my soul.

Afterward, a friend hugged me and I just started weeping. It was like the floodgates opened and I was able to truly let go of all turmoil I had been holding in heart. I didn’t know why that year had to be so hard—but God knew. I didn’t have to figure it all out or understand my heart—God did! And that was enough.

I was overwhelmed with the truth of the gospel. My soul sometimes feels crushed, but it never truly is. I feel forgotten at times, but my Lord was utterly abandoned so that I never have to face what I only think I’m facing in moments of depression. Christ fully bore the wrath of God that I deserved, and now I live in His righteousness!

Here is my hope and joy. Not in knowing God’s purpose for everything that happened that year—though now I do see fruit from it—but in the truth of the Cross. God gave me grace in that moment at New Attitude to stop listening to my troubled soul, and instead to start speaking the truth of God’s Word to it, as C.J. urged us to do.

It’s still a battle everyday, and I’ve enlisted the help of scholars and teachers such as D. Martin Lloyd Jones and Charles Spurgeon. But it is worth it. It is absolutely worth it.

Truly, no matter what changes happen in my life I can always sing this unchanging truth: “Hallelujah, all I have is Christ. Hallelujah, Jesus is my life.”

Tags: bible, Charles Spurgeon, CJ Mahaney, conference, cross, D. Martin Lloyd Jones, depression, direction, fruit, God, gospel, grace, growth, guidance, maturity, New Attitude, Next, Scripture, self-talk, speaking the truth to yourself

I’ve seen people dismiss the Bible because it portrays historical events that “just couldn’t happen.” Is this a reason do disbelieve the Bible? Or to “dwindle in unbelief” as I saw one person put it?

It is if, and only if, we live in a materialistic world. I don’t mean an attitude of finding your significance in your possessions. I’m referring to a philosophical position that says that physical “stuff” is all there is in this universe. If God either does not exist, or He does not interact with His world, we must reject the Bible as false.

However, because God exists and works in the created universe, we should not be surprised to find some things in the Bible that may surprise us. An axehead floats. A sea gets parted and over one million people pass through on dry ground. People rise from the dead. Someone’s hair is abnormally heavy. These things are only a problem if God is far removed from our world, or if the Bible teaches that God was not at work in the particular situation. Jesus walked on water. If the Bible made the claim that God had nothing to do with this event, we would have a problem on our hands. But the Bible makes no such claim. It everywhere assumes that things that “just don’t happen” occur in history. We shouldn’t be surprised when we see miracles and “natural impossibilities” occur because we live in a supernatural world.

Let me offer some final thoughts:

1. First, we shouldn’t immediately assume that abnormal things we observe are miraculous acts of God. Loving God with all our minds requires that we use all of our intellect to figure out how God’s world works. Science continually finds explanations for things that was once considered a mystery.
2. Second, we shouldn’t compartmentalize God’s activity as if He is involved in His world when miracles happen and is uninvolved when life continues “normally.” The Bible teaches that God is involved in all parts of the world at all times. Everything that happens, happens because God is at work. Miracles are merely instances of God working in ways that are not His typical means of interacting with His wold. Physical laws are not unbreakable rules. They are merely ways that describe how God normally guides His creation’s activity.
3. Third, the Bible never teaches that miracles used to happen all the time, whereas today they don’t happen anymore. Miracles didn’t happen every day back in biblical times. Remember that Scripture condenses thousands of years into a relatively small number of pages. Sometimes hundreds of years went by with no word from God and no miracle. It’s true that there were a great number of miracles in the time of Moses, Elijah/Elisha, and Jesus. Nevertheless, miracles didn’t happen every day even during these periods of history. Besides, today miracles still happen today. I have seen people get healed of illnesses and injuries when we prayed for them. I know of more instances of healing besides these. God is every bit as active in miracles today as He was in the Bible.
4. Finally, when you speak with people who don’t believe that the Bible is true, keep the concept of “worldview” in mind. A worldview describes how a person looks at the worlds. It includes your beliefs about what is right and wrong, about God, about ultimate reality, and about how you know what you know. If a person’s worldview includes the belief that miracles don’t or can’t happen, it may be helpful to address that when discussing Scripture with them. Of course, God can change people’s beliefs. He does this all the time when we share the gospel with others and God causes them to be born again and to have faith. He makes them believe certain things that they didn’t believe before. Still, God often works through means to achieve those ends. A well-reasoned argument about why miracles are possible may go a long way to helping someone trust that God exists, that they are a sinner, and that Jesus died for their sins.

Tags: Apologetics, belief, bible, evangelism, faith, gospel, materialism, miracles, naturalism, possibility, reading, supernaturalism, worldview