The Great Mystery of Prayer, Part III

Having finished Paul Miller's book on prayer, I'm ready to offer one final personal reflection (see my previous posts here and here).

One of the glorious effects of this book on my personal life has been a more consistent, systematic prayer for the members of Hickory Hill Baptist Church. Contemporaneous with the reading of this book was a conference I attended on "Shepherding Souls". I was reminded that, according to Acts 20:28, it is the Holy Spirit who appoints shepherds over sheep. The combined force of that reminder and Miller's fresh call to commune with the Father in prayer has impacted my soul.

Although I'm only a short way into this practice, I'm already seeing the effect. Among other things, I'm seeing that spending a specific time every morning praying for one particular sheep/sheep-family causes me to recognize on a deep level the sovereignty of God in that person's and/or family's life.

Every Sunday I hear updates: Joe is going in for knee surgery Thursday, Angie's uncle got another bad diagnosis, Bob's job announced more cuts coming in the next month or two. I hear all of those things and I feel a sense of empathy and identification, as shepherd and as friend.

But those life situations and updates are so easily divorced from God! But come Tuesday morning, as I spend however long praying for Bob, praying for his job, his boss, his family's income, for God's provision and intervention, well now things are different.

Because if prayer is anything, it is a recognition of God's absolute sovereignty (I love the quote, 'Everyone's a Calvinist on their knees'). Why prayer to God for Bob's job unless I acknowledge that God is sovereign over Bob's job, over Bob's boss, over Bob's boss' budget, etc. And so as I pray for Bob, in my mind and heart, I am bringing all of Bob's life under the sovereign hand of God.

Next Sunday now, when he comes to me and gives me his weekly update, I am postured now to think, feel, hear, and pray for him from the proper perspective of: God is good toward Bob, and God is in control of Bob's life/situation. This is good!

I am thankful to God for this turn of events in my life. The lack of prayer in my life has meant a decreased ability to shepherd well. May God continue to bring reformation into my heart and life.

From Reviling, Railing, and Mocking to Believing... All While Hanging on a Cross

I wonder if you've ever noticed something rather spectacular in the Gospel accounts. No doubt, the story of the thief repenting and believing on the Lord Jesus Christ in his last hour is a popular and well-known story, but there are two other verses in the Bible that make this story even more spectacular.

First, Luke's account in 23:32-43:

Two others, who were criminals, were led away to be put to death with him. And when they came to the place that is called The Skull, there they crucified him, and the criminals, one on his right and one on his left. ...And the people stood by, watching, but the rulers scoffed at him, saying, “He saved others; let him save himself, if he is the Christ of God, his Chosen One!” ...
One of the criminals who were hanged railed at him, saying, “Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!” But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.” And he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” And he said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”

Pretty spectacular, right? This criminal, obviously heart-broken and humbled by his death-sentence sees the dying Christ on the cross and is so moved by the sight that he repents of his rebellion and pleads with Jesus to reconcile him to God. And even more amazingly, Jesus freely agrees. It is surely true, grace is free.

But have you ever noticed Matthew and Mark's same account?

Matthew 27:44 "And the robbers who were crucified with him also reviled him in the same way [as the scribes and elders."

Mark 15:32 "Those who were crucified with him also reviled him."

Do you see? Perhaps it wasn't the man's death sentence at all that humbled him. If we believe in the inerrancy of Scripture, then both thieves, the one to his left and the one to his right, started out reviling him. They were both unmoved by their impending death. They were still hardened in their hearts, rebellious, and under the wrath of God.

But then, in an instant (Jesus was only on the cross for a matter of hours), God used the sight of Jesus suffering under the Father's wrath to soften one thief's heart, and to compel him to repent and put all his hope for redemption in the man crucified next to him. Wow! What a radical, instantaneous transformation. Who can deny that a man believing on the Lord Jesus is a sovereign act of God? Who but God alone can take a dying, hard-hearted man from reviling to desperately clinging for salvation in a matter of moments? And all that while the man is slowing suffocating, bleeding out, and having his flesh torn open. It wasn't like he didn't have other things to think about!

Marvel at the grace of God! And if that sovereign grace has drawn and compelled you, like this thief, to look upon this dying man and to cry out, "My Lord and my God, forgive me of my sins and reconcile me to the Father," then marvel in the free, sovereign grace of God all the more.

The Secret Will of God

On Sunday nights at HHBC we're trudging along through the book of Romans. Yesterday evening we discussed the will of God from Romans 1:10. This is an important and somewhat difficult topic to wade through these days because there are so many unbiblical ways that we speak about the will of God.

I argued that there are at least two different ways in which the Scriptures speak of God's will. The Bible speaks both of God's revealed will and his secret will. (This language of revealed and secret comes from Deut. 29.) The revealed will of God refers to the Scriptures. These are the things we are responsible to know and keep. When people talk about finding God's will, I want to just point them to the Scriptures. We are not mystics. God has already spoken to us and told us everything he expects us to know. Open the Bible and study! That is the will of God!

But there is another sense in which the Bible talks about God's will. The secret will of God refers to God's acts of providence. We are not responsible to know or discern these things. That's why it's called secret (i.e. not revealed). In a certain sense, if something happens then God willed it to happen. Whatever takes place in the world was willed by God (either directly or through some means). So everything that happens, from the blowing of a blade of grass in the wind to a hurricane brewing in the Atlantic, is the secret will of God. These things are for God alone to know (until they come to pass of course, at which time we know that he must have willed them).

As we discussed this, I listed a catalog from Scripture of various things God is said to "will" or actively control and decree in Scripture. I want to share these with all of you because it was very worshipful to read this list together and think about how big, sovereign, and in control our God is.

The Bible says that God wills, controls, ordains the following:

• the falling of sparrow to the ground
• a creature receiving food to eat (note: the Scripture writers obviously knew that animals hunt and/or gather their food, and yet they had no problem attributing the results to the will/decree of God)
• a creature not receiving food to eat
• the new and/or continued life of a creature
• the death of a creature
• the rain falling to the ground (and thus by extension, the moisture gathering in the clouds)
• the sun scorching the earth
• the clouds protecting the earth from the scorching sun
• the fruit that hangs on the branches of the vine
• the cattle a man keeps in his stalls
• the wine a man stores in his cellar
• the grain growing in a man's field
• the coming of insects
• the eating of insects
• the falling of hail
• the coming and destruction of storms
• the feeding of young ravens by their mothers (again, note the Scriptural awareness that God sometimes uses means)
• the falling off of a tree branch
• the falling off of a tree branch that hits a man (or doesn't hit a man, whatever the case may be)
• the casting of lots (if anything were left to chance, surely it would be the rolling of dice right? yet Scripture says that it is from the will of God)
• the poverty a man comes into
• the wealth a man comes into
• the rising of men
• the lowering of men
• the south wind
• a great fish and his food (poor Jonah)
• the waves of the ocean
• pregnancy (either getting pregnant or not getting pregnant)
• a man's sickness 
• a man's food (and/or lack thereof)
• a man's life and man's death

Isn't that amazing? What a wonderful list. There are certainly many more things that could be added to this list. I challenged our church to take a special color highlighter or pencil next time they read through the Bible and highlight or underline each occurrence of God ordaining or causing something to happen. I trust you will be blessed to see what a big, in control God you serve. He is not surprised by anything. On the contrary, he is so big that he works in, through, and over everything to bring about his perfect will for his glory. And what should we do? Pursue a knowledge of God's revealed will in the Scriptures and act in obedience while we rest in his sovereign hands.