A Far Country

Christ leads me through no darker rooms, than He went through before.

- Richard Baxter

Did you wake up not feeling like reading your Bible and praying? How many times today have you had to battle not feeling like doing things you know would be good for you?

While it's true that this is our indwelling sin that we must repent of and fight against, there's more going on.

Think about this strange pattern that occurs over and over in just about every area of life:

• Good food requires discipline to prepare and eat while junk food tends to be the most tasty, addictive, and convenient.
• Keeping the body healthy and strong requires frequent deliberate discomfort while it only takes constant comfort to go to pot.
• You have to make yourself pick up that nourishing theological book while watching a movie can feel so inviting.
• You frequently have to force yourself to get to devotions and prayer while sleeping, reading the sports, and checking Facebook seems effortless.
• To play beautiful music requires thousands of hours of tedious practice.
• To excel in sports requires monotonous drills ad nauseum.
• It takes years and years of schooling just to make certain opportunities possible.
• This goes on and on.

The pattern is this: the greater joys are obtained through struggle and pain, while brief, unsatisfying, and often destructive joys are right at our fingertips. Why is this?

Because, in great mercy, God is showing us everywhere, in things that are just shadows of heavenly things, that there is a great reward for those who struggle through (Hebrews 10:32-35). He is reminding us repeatedly each day to walk by faith and not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7).

Each struggle is an invitation by God to follow in the footsteps of his Son, "who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God" (Hebrews 12:2).

Those who are spiritually blind only see futility in these things. But for those who have eyes to see, God has woven hope (faith in future grace) right into the futility of creation (Romans 8:20-21). Each struggle is a pointer saying, "Look! Look to the real Joy set before you!"

So when you don't feel like doing what you know is best for you, take heart and don't give in. Your Father is pointing you to the reward he has planned for all who endure to the end (Matthew 24:13).

For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. (1 Corinthians 4:17-18)

- Jon Bloom & Amen

Ezekiel is the only OT writer to promise a “new heart” to Israel (18:31; 36:26). He promises hearts of flesh in place of hearts of stone. What has given the people of Judah hearts of flesh in the first place?

Ezekiel 14:1-7 gives an answer: They have set (stone – gold and silver) idols in their hearts, and those who worship stone idols become stony. The new heart is a heart that is no longer devoted to stone.

Devoted to what then? We can corporatize this; Ezekiel is not just talking about individual Israelites worshiping idols, and hardening their hearts as a result. He is talking about Judah as a whole: They have set dead stone at the heart of their corporate, liturgical life, where they should have set the Lord of life. Ultimately, the transformation of hearts of flesh into stone requires an incarnation, an object of worship in flesh. When Jesus is set before the eyes and in the heart of His people, then their hearts are made human again.


- Peter J. Leithart

Shafia's Story:



- VOM Blog

Some precious friends sent us this album (& others) & I can honestly say that it has certainly been years since a song ministered to me as powerfully as this one is at this time in my life:

Hide Away in the Love of Jesus (click link to play full song)

Come weary saints, though tired and weak
Hide away in the love of Jesus
Your strength will return by His quiet streams
Hide away in the love of Jesus

Come wand’ring souls, and find your home
Hide away in the love of Jesus
He offers the rest that you yearn to know
Hide away in the love of Jesus

Hear Him calling your name
See the depths of His love
in the wounds of His grace
Hide away

Come guilty ones, weighed down with sin
Hide away in the love of Jesus
The freedom you long for is found in Him
Hide away in the love of Jesus

Hear Him calling your name
See the depths of His love
in the wounds of His grace
Hide away

Come hopeless hearts, do not despair
Hide away in the love of Jesus
For ten thousand joys await you there
Hide away in the love of Jesus

As the health care debate rages in the US, Tokyo lawmakers set a maximum waist size. Are you too fat for Japan?

This is no joke!

- globalpost.com

Once a blessing to my hometown of Birmingham, Al, Pastors David Prince & Jeremy Haskins are now blessing Ashland Avenue Baptist Church in Lexington, Ky with influence spreading beyond to folks like me in Japan & all over the world.

Listen to this very practical conversation on adoption as Jeremy shares with David his adoption journey. It's not only practical & helpful, but very encouraging & hope-full.

When Jesus announces the betrayal by Judas at the Passover, He alludes to Psalm 41:9. The one who dipped his hand with me in the dish, Jesus says, betrays Him; centuries earlier, David had written, “My close friend, in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted up his heel against me.” That is Judas; he lifts his heel to crush Jesus.

This all seems wrong. Jesus is the conquer; Jesus is the seed of the woman. He should be the one lifting up His heel against others, against the wicked, against the Satanic accuser. But that’s not what happens. Judas the betrayer lifts his heel, and Jesus looks like the serpent being crushed beneath. Jesus looks like the one with the crushed head, not the one with the bruised heel.

That is the foolishness of God that reveals the deepest wisdom.

- Peter Leithart, Lifting the Heel

2 Quotes:

1) The greatest need of our missionary forces are fresh outpourings of the Holy Spirit. The flesh profits nothing...

2) Evangelism / missions cannot be organized into existence. They are born from above. They are the result of the Spirit's work in the church.