New Books of Note

Next week I’ll be on a short sabbatical, so along with enjoying family time and a hike in the Snoqualmie national forest (fighting the snow?), I’ll be spending time reading Bernard of Clairvaux, Blaise Pascal, Ralph Venning, and Marva Dawn; I’ll probably just do a few blogs on Bernard and Blaise.  For now, I want to point out a some newer books that I’m interested in.  (Sorry for the horrible formatting…I tried to fix it a few times, but finally gave up.)

 This biography of Bonhoeffer by Eric Metaxes looks great.

This one on dying well looks solid as well; it’s by Rob Moll.

Based on John Fesko’s other books, this brief commentary on Ecclesiastes looks like a good one to have if you’re studying or preaching through Qoheleth. 

 

Though it isn’t a new release, I saw that Westminster Seminary California now has Concordia in stock.  This is an essential book if you want to learn what Lutherans confess. 

If you liked “Why Johnny Can’t Preach,” you’ll probably like this one by Gordon that is coming out soon. 

 

Finally, since I deeply appreciate Don Carson’s work, this new one by him will be on my shelves in the next few months. 

Stay tuned for some Bernard and Pascal!

shane lems

sunnyside wa

The Tender Mercy of God

One of the great old hymns we use here for worship is “Your Mercy” by Isaac Watts.  The first part goes like this:

“Your mercy my God is the theme of my song;
The joy of my heart and the boast of my tongue!”

I love the old theological Latin for mercy, misericordia Dei, which means something like the affectionate compassion of God towards sinners.  In the words of Thomas Watson, “It is the great design of the Scripture to represent God as merciful.”  Scripture teaches that raindrops are like showers of God’s mercy, he mercifully feeds all creatures, and his tender mercies are over all his works like the touch of a painter’s hand  (Ps. 145.9, Matt. 5.45, Acts 14.17, etc.).  Watson’s other words describing God’s mercy (which I’ve summarized) are worth contemplating as we make God’s mercy the theme of our song.

 God’s mercy is “a lodestone [magnet] to draw sinners to him.”  “God is more inclinable to mercy than wrath (cf. Ex 34.6-7).  Mercy is his darling attribute, which he most delights in (Mic. 7.18).  Mercy pleases him.”  “Mercy is not the fruit of our goodness, but the fruit of God’s goodness.  Mercy is an alms that God bestows.” 

“Mercy stays [restrains] the speedy execution of God’s justice.  Mercy gets a reprieve for the sinner, and stops the speedy process of justice.  God would, by his goodness, lead sinners to repentance.”

“God’s mercy is free.  To set up merit is to destroy mercy.  Nothing can deserve mercy, because we are polluted in our blood.  We may force God to punish us, but not to love us.”  His mercy is overflowing, plentiful, and abundant.  His mercies over all are new every morning.

God is “desirous that sinners should touch the golden scepter of his mercy and live.”  He calls “sinners to come and lay hold on his mercy” (Rev. 22.17).  “Mercy woos sinners, it even kneels down to them.  God says, Poor sinner, suffer [allow] me to love thee, be willing to let me save thee.”

Why don’t you believe in God’s mercy?  Do your sins discourage you?  “God’s mercy can pardon great sins” (Ps 25.11). 

“Go to God for mercy.  Oh pray for mercy!  God has treasures of mercy; prayer is the key that opens these treasures; and in prayer, be sure to carry Christ in your arms, for all the mercy comes through Christ.”  “Though God may refuse us when we come for mercy in our own name, yet he will not when we come in Christ’s name.”

Once we realize the tenderness of God’s abundant and free mercy, another verse of the hymn makes perfect sense.

“Your mercy is more than a match for my heart;
Which wonders to feel its own hardness depart!
Dissolved by your goodness I fall to the ground;
And weep to the praise of the mercy I’ve found!”

[The above comments by Thomas Watson can be found in Part II, chapter 9 of his Body of Divinity.  UPDATE/EDIT: I also just found an entire section on "Mercy" in Watson's treatment of the beatitudes.]

shane lems

sunnyside wa

Church, Christianity, and History

Christians/churches are often prone to one of these two tendencies, as Carl Trueman notes:

“An idolatry of the new and the novel, with the concomitant disrespect for anything traditional; or a nostalgia for the past which is little more than an idolatry of the old and the traditional.  Both are disempowering: the first leaves the church as a free-floating anarchic entity which is doomed to reinvent Christianity anew every Sunday, and prone to being subverted and taken over by any charismatic (in the non-theological sense!) leader or group which cares to flex its muscle; the second leaves the church bound to the past as its leaders care to write that past and thus unable to engage critically with her own tradition.”

“Humble and critical engagement with history is thus imperative for the Christian: humble, because God has worked through history, and we would be arrogant simply to ignore the past as irrelevant; critical, because history has been made by sinful, fallen, and thus deeply fallible human beings, and thus is no pure and straightforward revelation of God.  It is this balance of humility and criticism that we must strike if we are truly to benefit from history.”

From Trueman’s fine collection of essays, The Minority Report (Scotland: Christian Focus Publications, 2008), 116-117.  By the way – it’s at less than $12, it’s a steal!

shane lems

sunnyside wa

Denominational Identity

 I’m not entirely comfortable with the term “the Reformed Faith.”  I cherish, teach, and defend Reformation truths, but I don’t use the term “the Reformed Faith.”  In my experiences, this term has not been employed very well.  I like how Mike Horton explains this topic.

“Although we do not have a God’s-eye perspective, we do belong to a community that is defined by the inbreaking of the age to come that relativizes all times and places, putting in jeopardy all of our cherished locations in this age.  It even challenges our tendency to find our ultimate identity in our own denomination or tradition.  While vigilant to uncover our own prejudices that work against it, we strive toward a catholic hearing of God’s Word.  From this perspective we should not speak of a Reformed faith or an Orthodox theology or a Lutheran confession, but of a Christian faith, theology, and confession, from a Reformed, Orthodox, or Lutheran perspective.”

Michael Horton, People and Place (Lousiville: WJK, 2008), 210.

shane lems

sunnyside wa

God Is Not Obligated…

 ”Suppose ten people sin and sin equally.  Suppose God punishes five of them and is merciful to the other five.  Is this injustice?  No!  In this situation five people get justice and five people get mercy.  No one gets injustice.  What we tend to assume is this: if God is merciful to five he must be equally merciful to the other five.  Why?  He is never obligated to be merciful.  If he is merciful to nine of the ten, the tenth cannot complain that he is a victim of injustice.  God never owes mercy.  God is not obliged to treat all men equally.  Maybe I’d better say that again.  God is never obliged to treat all men equally.  If he were ever unjust to us, we would have reason to complain.  But simply because he grants mercy to my neighbor gives me no claim on his mercy.  Again we must remember that mercy is always voluntary.  “I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy” (Ex 33:19). 

There are only two things I ever receive from God – justice or mercy.  I never receive injustice from his hand.

R. C. Sproul, The Holiness of God, chapter 6.

shane lems

sunnyside wa