From Paul’s perspective, everything that is coming to us from God comes through Christ Jesus. Christ Jesus has won our pardon; he has reconciled us to God; he has canceled our sin; he has secured the gift of the Spirit for us; he has granted eternal life to us and promises the life of the consummation; he has made us children of the new covenant; his righteousness has been accounted as ours; he has risen from the dead, and all of God’s sovereignty is mediated through him and directed to our good and to God’s glory. This is the Son whom God sent to redeem us. In God’s all-wise plan and all-powerful action, all these blessing have been won by his [S]on’s odious death and triumphant resurrection. All the blessings God has for us are tied up with the work of Christ.  (A Call to Spiritual Reformation, 189).

How awesome is our Saviour?

Post from: Julian Freeman

How Much Do You Love Your Saviour?

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There is simply no love quite like a father for his children. There is nothing that makes me feel better than knowing my children are safe, protected, and provided for. And there is nothing that strikes terror into the core of my being like the thought of my children suffering. The thought of any one of my precious girls in pain or sadness makes me instantly recoil emotionally. I get a sick feeling in my gut and I’m instantly overcome with the awareness that I would do anything—anything—to end their suffering and to make them happy again.

I thought about that and I was overwhelmed by awareness of this love that owns me and moves me without me even being consciously aware of it most days.

And then I thought about the heavenly Father and his love. Filled with infinitely more love for his Son—a perfect love for a perfect Son—he willingly chose to ‘give’ him for a world of sinners. He gave him, knowing that he would be mocked, belittled, shamed, abused, scorned, rejected, beaten, stripped naked, and killed: publicly displayed as one bearing the curse of God. That’s a love I know nothing of.

But the love is greater still. Ponder these words, of the Son to the Father:

“Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me.” (Mark 14.36)

My love for my children, being nothing like the heavenly Father’s love, would have been moved to give in, to compromise. But the Father of Jesus has bigger, greater love; his love for Jesus’s glory and for my good is too great to be moved. He was willing to deny his True Son’s request for the good of his soon-to-be adopted sons & daughters. The love of the Father was planned and determined.

Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him; he has put him to grief…. (Isaiah 53.10)

“Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man who stands next to me,” declares the Lord of hosts. [I will] strike the shepherd….” (Zechariah 13.7; [cf. Mark 14.27])

His love is not just a love that would allow his Son to be sacrificed; his love is a love that would willingly crush his Son. He gave his Son, knowing that he himself would have to give full vent to his holy wrath against his Son on the cross. The Father who loves the Son, crushed the son… for me.

No matter how overwhelming my love for my children may be, it doesn’t hold a candle to my heavenly Father’s love, in scope, in purpose, in depth, in power, or in steadfastness.

I want to make it my prayer that whenever I think of my love for my children, I would let that love serve me by pointing me to the true love of the true Father who, in the gospel, has loved and who continues to love with a greater love than eternity will allow me to explore. Human love serves its best and noblest purpose when it doesn’t end with us, but points us to the one who is love, and who has shown us love in his Son, Jesus.

... but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5.8)

See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. (1 John 3.1)

Post from: Julian Freeman

Letting My Love Serve Me

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It is only appropriate to begin with the Father.

I remember taking a course not too long ago with Bruce Ware (author of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit). Through that course the Spirit really opened my eyes to the glory of God the Father. I think too often in Christian circles we can think of the Father as aloof or angry. Or sometimes we take him for granted. The false reasoning goes like this: 'We've always had him. But the Spirit is so New Covenant! And Jesus is just like us... we can identify easier with him.'

How mistaken and how tragic!

It is ironic that in our rush to make much of Jesus, we forget that his mission was to bring us to the Father. He taught us to pray in his name to the Father. At the end, he will hand over all things to the Father. Jesus makes much of the Father -- so why would we who want to make much of Jesus make little of what he made much of? If we truly want to honour Jesus, we must honour the Father.

It is too easy to forget that it was a display of the Father's love that sent Christ into the world for us (John 3:16). It is too easy to overlook the fact that the Father has planned our salvation from eternity past, that all of what he accomplishes in us might be to the praise of his (the Father's!) glory (Eph 1.3-14; Eph 3.20-21). It is the Father's wise plan which has been brought to bear for our salvation. It was his love that was set on us. It was his Son who was crushed for us. It is his Spirit who indwells us now, bearing with us, sustaining us until the end.

All that to say, I've grown to love the Father as a unique member of the Triune Godhead. He is the Initiator, the Planner, the one who hears our prayers, and the Sovereign One who gives direction to the Son and the Spirit for the accomplishment of my salvation.

Here are a few other thoughts I've had on the Father over the last couple years:

• Why we need to worship God the Father first for our salvation
• Beware your love for Christ does not outweigh your love for the Father
• The Father as the One to Whom We Pray
• The Father as the One Who Loves to Give

I know that I will spend the rest of eternity contemplating, exploring, and delighting in the Triune God -- but I pray that however much time God gives me here on earth would be spent on getting a head start now.

------------

** This is written as part of the series 30 for 30: Reflections on Life at My 30th Birthday **

Post from: Julian Freeman

The Heavenly Father

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A father's hands

One of the grounding realities to all of life is identity. Who am I? Where have I come from? What is my value? Am I loved? What is my purpose? As I look back on my life to this point I realize that much of the reason why I have been so easily swayed in my affections is because I haven't fully grasped and applied truth to these basic questions of identity.

As I reflect on the significant seasons of growth and change in my life I see a consistent pattern: these were always times when I was beginning to connect the dots between the gospel that has saved me and my current identity. In other words, the most life-changing seasons have been those times when I realized that the gospel was not just God's means of giving me a ticket to heaven on some future day, but rather, the gospel is God's means of grace to me now. In the gospel I find every comfort and every assurance of God's love for me. In the gospel I find my identity, my value, my purpose.

The gospel of Jesus Christ is a message of how God's True Son was killed in order that we might become adopted sons & daughters, indwelt by the very same Spirit who was in Jesus. The same Spirit who was in Jesus, moving him to pray, filling him with compassion, giving him direction, comforting him through the weakness of his humanity, reminding him of his mission, empowering his miraculous works -- that same Spirit is in me. He's in every Christian, every son and daughter of God.

But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” (Galatians 4.4-6)

For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ.... (Romans 8.14-17)

I'm not alone, I don't think, in coming to see just how important the doctrine of adoption is and how essentially it is bound up with the gospel. JI Packer was once asked to sum up the gospel in three words. Here was his response:

“... My proposal would be adoption through propitiation, and I do not expect ever to meet a richer or more pregnant summary of the gospel than that.” (J.I. Packer, Knowing God [Downers Grove, IL: 1993], 214)

Here's the thing: while, like any Calvinist, I see that the gospel is about God making much of God and acting for his righteousness' sake, I have now come to see that his righteousness (shown in the propitiation accomplished by Jesus (Rom 3.23-26) means a lavish display of fatherly love towards his adopted sons & daughters. His covenantal promises through all generations to be our God, and to have us as his people, is bound up in adoption -- dwelling with us, in us, in our midst, as a father with his children:

“I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing;
then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you,
and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty.” (2 Cor 6.16-18)

If God is so committed to loving me and being with me (for his own righteousness' sake!) that he is willing to bear all his wrath on his True Son to adopt me and have me conformed to his image (Rom 8.29), then I have a meaningful identity: I am a child of the King. I have a purpose: to reflect my Father. I have value: I have been purchased with the blood of Jesus. And I am loved (Gal 2.20; John 3.16; John 15.13; 1 John 3.16; Rom 5.8). I thank God that I can never undo that, no matter how much I mess up. No matter how much I fail, no matter how much other people value me or don't, I know who I am in Christ. I am a son of God.

I have learned that the gospel takes care of the big questions of my identity. That gives great freedom to live with joy, hope, and expectation of God doing great things in me and through me... because he is my Father and I am his son. I pray that however many years I have left would be one continual season of growth in living in light of the reality that God has made me his child.

Post from: Julian Freeman

My Identity as God’s Child

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When I thought of freedom, the first thought in my mind is Christians taking liberty in moral issues and then when confonted, just chalking it up to 'freedom.' Knowing that it could be abused in this way, I wasn't all that happy about preaching it as something we should pursue.

But that was before I studied it... and my mind was changed completely. By the time Sunday rolled around, I was super-excited to preach it!

I began the message by attempting to begin to answer the question, 'What is Christian Freedom?' Answering that question alone could be at least 3 sermons. Knowing that my answer would have to be somewhat incomplete because of time constraints, I gave this opening definition of Christian freedom:

Christian freedom is the ability to participate in the life of God so that our desires are conformed to his, our will becomes his, enabling us to always do what we want without necessity or coercion.

In other words, it is the ability to always act for our joy and for his glory—and have those two as one.

By 'participate in the life of God,' I meant

1. Freedom of Access to God as Father
2. Freedom from the Law in God the Son
3. Freedom to Live in God the Spirit

Where once we had no freedom to approach God in prayer, now our prayers are acceptable and pleasing to him. Where once we had no freedom from the Law, but were at once both commanded to work and condemned to die, now we have freedom from works and freedom to rest in justification. Where once we had no freedom to please God or to do as we desired, now the Spirit of God indwells us, conforming our desires to his.

The more we participate in the life of Holy Trinity, the more we're conformed to him from the inside-out. Because of the work of the Holy Spirit, we gain true freedom of will so that we may choose and desire whatever we want, and since what we want is in line with the character of God, what brings us joy will be the same things that bring him glory. And he gives us the power to do it.

That's a great thing to think about!

Post from: Julian Freeman

A Few Thoughts on Christian Freedom

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One challenging example he gave was that of Ephesians 1. How many times have we read Ephesians 1 and gloried in the amazing grace of God which called us, sought us, won us, and keeps us? Too many to count! And yet, how many times have we thought seriously about the pronoun 'he' / 'him' / 'his' in that passage? To whom does that refer in which instance? 

It is important to understand whose grace we are revelling in, and whose praise all of this is for. After all, getting the praise of 'his' glorious grace right is the very point of the passage! 

Admittedly, the pronouns in the passage can seem a tad difficult to identify. Here is Dr Ware's interpretation (based on the ESV translation):

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places [i.e. Praise the Father who gives blessings through the work of Christ, mediated to us by the Holy Spirit], even as [the Father] chose us in [Christ] before the foundation of the world, that we should be blameless before [the Father]. In love [the Father] predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ [to the Father] according to the purpose of [the Father’s] will, to the praise of [the Father’s] glorious grace, with which [the Father] has blessed us in [his beloved Son]. In [the Son] we have redemption through [the Son's] blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of [the Father’s] grace, which [the Father] lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of [the Father’s] will, according to [the Father’s] purpose, which [the Father] set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in [Christ], things in heaven and things on earth. 

In [Christ] we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of [the Father] who works all things after the counsel of [the Father’s] will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of [the Father’s] glory. In [Christ] you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in [Christ], were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of [the Father’s] glory.

If we were to praise God for his work in salvation, based on this text, the praise would necessarily be Trinitarian. All the members of the Godhead have their roles, and the glory of all three is extolled. But whose glorious grace should be the centre of our attention and praise, based on these verses? 

Is this reflected in your prayer life? How about your private worship? Why are we so quick to abandon the primacy of praise to the Father for his work in salvation?

Post from: Julian Freeman

The Primacy of Praise to the Father

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If we reject an over-emphasis on God's love as the basis of his character, we run the the risk of focusing too much on his justice or transcendence. If we seek to reject the feminist tide of our culture and hold to biblical distinctions between male and female, we run the risk of keeping women back from the legitimate ways that they are to serve and minister in the body of Christ. The examples are endless, and for every false doctrine there is an equally-wrong opposite reaction offered in an attempt to correct it.

Tim Challies made a comment once, when reviewing a Brian McLaren book, that McLaren appears to love Jesus, but to hate God (i.e. the Father). Bruce Ware made a nearly identical statement in a theology course I took with him recently. They both made the statement because... well... it's true. But here's what concerns me--I wonder how far we are from being the same.

I would never suggest that anyone at GFC or in our circles hates the Father. But I do wonder how our love for him compares to our love for Christ.

For whatever reason, the tide of our Christian culture seems to be waxing strong in our love for and devotion to Christ. Perhaps because of the resurgent emphasis on biblical as opposed to systematic theology. Maybe it is the fact that we tend to focus more on the fulfilment of our salvation, rather than the promise and story leading up to it. Maybe it is our culture's disdain of authority (and especially authority held by a male, patriarchal figure). Maybe it is just the fact of Christ's 'like-us-ness' that makes it easier for us to imagine him. Regardless of the reason, it is far more common to hear a Christian these days talking about their love for Christ than it is to hear a Christian talk about their love for the Father.

Growing in our love for Christ is always a good thing. But growing in our love for Christ at the expense of our love for the Father is not a good thing. But is this a genuine problem?

Think through the songs you sing in church. Think through the Bible reading you like to do most. Think through your conversations you've had recently with fellow believers. How central to your conversation, your reading, or your worship is Father himself, distinct from the other members of the Trinity? Are the affections of your heart warmed the same way when you think of God the Father as when you think of Jesus?

It was the Father's will to create. It was the Father who chose us to be in Christ before the foundations of the world. It was the Father who planned in eternity past to send Christ, the Father who promised Christ, and the Father who carried out that plan. It was the Father's will to crush Jesus to save you. It was the Father who had to withhold his wrath for thousands of years and then bear it all on his only true Son, thus breaking an eternity of perfect union and unbroken fellowship. It was the Father who looked away from Christ in anger in order to look to you with grace.

It was the Father's plan to send his true Son to make you an adopted Son. It is the Father who gives you his Spirit. It is the Father who holds the king's heart in his hand, who governs all this according to the counsel of his will, and who will bring about the end of all things in the fulness of time. It is the Father's throne on which Christ sits, and to whom Christ will return the kingdom at the end of time. 

How is your love for the Father?

Post from: Julian Freeman

Beware the Pendulum

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