The transforming power of Scripture

R. C. Trench —

Lord, what a change within us one short hour
Spent in Thy presence will prevail to make!
What heavy burdens from our bosoms take,
What parched ground refresh as with a shower!
We kneel, and all around us seems to lower;
We rise, and all, the distant and the near,
Stands forth in sunny outline brave and clear;
We kneel, how weak! we rise, how full of power!
Why, therefore, should we do ourselves this wrong,
Or other, that we are not always strong,
That we are ever overborne with care,
That we should ever weak or heartless be,
Anxious or troubled, when with us is prayer,
And joy and strength and courage are with Thee!

[Christian Quotation of the Day, 1/1/08]

Questions to ask when reading your Bible

Practical Tips for Reading Your Bible and Submitting to the Spirit —

1. Read with the intent of knowing God and His mind, not “solving problems.”
2. Establish a time and place that you will meet God every day — e.g., in the blue chair at 6:30 a.m.
3. Keep a Bible, pad & pen (and maybe a devotional book) at that location.
4. Read the Bible systematically & with balance (history, poetry, prophets, gospels, epistles). Links to several Bible reading plans are in the previous post, "A new year of Bible reading."
5. For every two minutes you read, meditate for one minute. [Don Whitney has helpful tips for meditating on Scripture.]
   
6. Keep a log of what passage you read.

• What is the main idea/central truth?
• What does this passage reveal about God?
• What is one key verse that you can think about today?
• Pray the passage.
• Commit to do (at least) one thing that day that will reinforce what you learned.

A new year of Bible reading

The spiritual life is simple, though it is not easy.

It is simple in that the means to growing in Christ is not complicated; it is not easy in that the discipline required to apply God’s grace is difficult (discipline requires self-control, which is not natural for the natural man).

So how does one grow in Christ?

We grow in Christ the same way we came to be identified with Christ — by grace through faith. This is the very point Paul made with the Galatians, who were attempting to be saved by grace and kept through works —

You foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified? This is the only thing I want to find out from you: did you receive the Spirit by the works of the Law, or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? (Gal. 3:1-3; NASB)

In other words, “having heard and been taught the crucifixion of Christ and the truth of salvation by faith — with the resulting empowerment of the Holy Spirit — how can you possibly think about being sanctified by the flesh? That’s utter foolishness!”

To such a statement, we readily offer our agreement. Yet in practice, many of us are closely aligned to the legalistic Galatians. We attempt to prove our “goodness” to God by our various spiritual disciplines and activities, without relying on His transforming Spirit. We know we must be saved by grace, but we like to live by law.

That kind of spiritual life is not only foolish, but also deadly — the mind set on the flesh is death (Rom. 8:6) and the deeds of the flesh cannot please God (Rom. 8:8). Yet if you are putting the deeds of the body to death by means of the power of the Spirit, you will live (Rom. 8:13). So life in Christ is dependent on living in the Spirit. And living by the power of the Spirit means that we will fill our minds with the Spirit’s sword — the Word of God.

To live by faith is to saturate our minds, find joy in, lean and depend on, be guided by, trust in, be reproved, corrected, and trained for righteousness by the Word of God. The means to a godly spiritual life is simple — it is to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Word of God (2 Pt. 3:18) to the point that our lives are controlled by the Word of God so that we increasingly grow in hatred of sin and increasingly move towards God in Christlikeness. As John Piper has noted,

This Word…cuts through he fog of Satan’s lies and shows me where true and lasting happiness is to be found. And so the Word helps me stop trusting in the potential of sin to make me happy. Instead, the Word entices me to trust in God’s promises.…

The role of God’s Word is to feed faith’s appetite for God. And, in doing this, it weans my heart away from the deceptive taste of lust. At first, lust begins to trick me into feeling that I would really miss out on some great satisfaction if I followed the path of purity. But then I take up the sword of the Spirit and begin to fight. I read that it is better to gouge out my eye than to lust. I read that if I think about things that are pure and lovely and excellent, the peace of God will be with me (Philippians 4:8-9). I read that setting the mind on the flesh brings death, but setting the mind on the Spirit brings life and peace (Romans 8:6). I read that lust wages war against my soul (1 Peter 2:11) and that the pleasures of this life choke out the life of the Spirit (Luke 8:14). But best of all, I read that God withholds no good thing from those who walk uprightly (Psalm 84:11) and that the pure in heart will see God (Matthew 5:8).

As I pray for my faith to be satisfied with God’s life and peace, the sword of the Spirit carves the sugar coating off the poison of lust. I see it for what it is. And by the grace of God, its alluring power is broken. [Battling Unbelief, pp. 141-3.]

How shall you fill your mind with the Word of God so as to be increasingly controlled by it? By reading, studying, meditating on, memorizing, and listening to it as much as you can, as often as you can. In a word, read the Word. There is no short cut to transformation. It comes by the hearing (reading) of the Word (Rom. 10:17).

How then shall you read? The best means to reading is to have a systematic plan for reading Scripture on a regular basis. Some can discipline themselves to some form of regular reading on their own, but most of us need a system that will help us. Of course there are dangers with following a formal plan, as Robert Murray M’Cheyne has noted:

• Formality (legalism) — this is the tendency of “having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof” (2 Tim. 3:5).
• Self-righteousness and self-complacency — the temptation to be content with reading without embracing conviction, repentance, and transformation.
• Careless reading — “Few tremble at the Word of God.”
• A yoke too heavy to bear — allowing the duty of discipline to distract us from the joy of the privilege.

But there are also advantages! Again, M’Cheyne summarizes:

• The whole Bible will be read through in an orderly manner in the course of a year — “If we pass over some parts of Scripture, we shall be incomplete Christians.”
• Time will not be wasted in choosing what portions to read.
• Parents will have a regular subject upon which to examine their children and servants.
• The pastor will know in what part of the pasture the flock is feeding.
• The sweet bond of Christian love and unity will be strengthened – “We shall be often led to think of those dear brothers and sisters in the Lord, here and elsewhere, who agree to join with us in reading those portions.…We shall pray over the same promises, mourn over the same confessions, praise God in the same songs, and be nourished by the same words of eternal life.”

Several different plans are available (this is far from a complete list, but I have found these to be helpful):

• M’Cheyne’s Plan (4 daily readings; OT once per year, NT and Psalms twice per year)
• Through the Bible in a year (this is the orginal Discipleship Journal reading plan; it has four daily readings)
• Book at a time reading plan (two daily readings)
• Chronological Bible reading plan
• Through the NT in a year

What is important is not so much what plan you choose or if you even choose a plan, but that you use some means for systematically filling your mind with the Word of God so that it can deepen its transforming work in your life.

It’s not complicated. It will require strenuous discipline — a discipline that God has equipped you to accomplish through the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit. Read the Word.

Trouble Arising Early to Pray?

Do you have trouble arising early in the morning to pray?

This word of encouragement and exhortation from John Calvin is a good encouragement to continuance in the discipline of prayer:

“Although we ought always to raise our minds upwards towards God, and pray without ceasing, yet such is our weakness, which requires to be supported, such our torpor, which requires to be stimulated, that it is requisite for us to appoint special hours for this exercise, hours which are not to pass away without prayer, and during which the whole affections of our minds are to be completely occupied; namely, when we rise in the morning, before we commence our daily work, when we sit down to food, when by the blessing of God we have taken it, and when we retire to rest. This, however, must not be a superstitious observance of hours, by which, as it were, performing a task to God, we think we are discharged as to other hours. It should rather be considered a discipline by which our weakness is exercised and stimulated.…

“It must be our anxious care, whenever we are ourselves pressed, or see others pressed by any trial, instantly to have recourse to God. And again, in any prosperity of ourselves or others, we must not omit to testify our recognition of God's hand by praise and thanksgiving. Lastly, we must in all our prayers carefully avoid wishing to confine God to certain circumstances, or prescribe to him the time, place, or mode of action. In like manner, we are taught by [the Lord’s] prayer not to fix any law or impose any condition upon him, but leave it entirely to him to adopt whatever course of procedure seems to him best, in respect of method, time, and place. For, before we offer up any petition for ourselves, we ask that his will may be done, and by so doing place our will in subordination to his, just as if we had laid a curb upon it, that, instead of presuming to give law to God, it may regard him as the ruler and disposer of all its wishes.”

(HT: CQOD)

These words echo the chapters I read this week in Spurgeon's Lectures to My Students ("The Minister's Private Prayer," and "Our Public Prayer"). They are both well worth reading.