Song Spotlight

We’re going to sing a relatively new song this Sunday called “Take My Heart with Altar Fire.” It’s a fantastic song, and a perfect one to sing on Pentecost! Here’s why:

The imagery in the title points us to Paul’s words in Romans 12:1—“I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.” This song is a prayer for God to transform our lives into lives of worship! 

The first two verses of this song start with visible actions and audible speech. They shift into the secret actions and thoughts of the heart that only God sees. They end with pleas for God to transform those deeds and words so that they are holy and true. The last verse gets to the core of the problem. Our yearnings, motivations, and delights are broken. We can filter the words and actions that people see so we look godly and righteous, but what about our hearts? The heart is the source of the bad things we do and say, and even if we manage to filter those out we’re still left with the corrupt hearts that produced them.

The truth is that we can’t really change our hearts. We can’t, in our own power, make our hearts hate sin, straighten our “bent desires,” or unwaveringly believe God’s promises. We need God to work in us, and that is exactly what the Spirit does! The same Spirit that fills us and joins us to Christ also makes us like him. We call this sanctification. He is working in us like a refining fire to burn out the corruption and to clean out our hearts to make room for the presence of God in us. Sometimes the process is painful—after all, fire hurts! But this fire also brings healing and peace. Don’t fear it, and don’t run from it. Pray instead for the Spirit to purge your heart so that it longs, above all else, to be in God’s presence and to see him glorified. 

“Fire of God consume my heart, burn it down to only faith

Til all that’s left of me is only you, Christ my glory, Christ my praise.”

Justin

Scripture Reflections

…on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. (Rev. 22:2b)

Over and over, Revelation answers the questions and problems of Genesis. Why were heaven and earth separated? So that they could be united in the new Jerusalem! Darkness was separated from light, but would it ever be vanquished? The Lamb is light, and his victory will swallow up darkness in a perpetual day! Why did there have to be two distinct people—Adam and Eve—separated but made to be joined? Because they foreshadow the marriage of the Lamb and the Church!

Genesis is answered and explained by what we read in Revelation. It should not surprise us, then, when the tree of life returns, full of fruit and healing for all. What was once in the garden is now recreated in the new heavens and new earth, yet the new surpasses the old. Instead of one fruit, we now see twelve kinds of fruit, and even the leaves bring healing.

But both of these trees are simply sacramental embodiments of the greater tree, the true tree of life, which is the cross. On that tree healing and life are offered to all, and all who eat of that tree will live forever. Eden’s tree points forward to the cross just as the new Jerusalem’s tree points back to it. Both revolve around Jesus, pierced for us, hanging on the tree of the cross, offering life to the world.

We are constantly looking for life. New habits, new friends, a new job, pleasure and power—our quest goes on and on. But from the beginning of the Bible to its end, the message is clear: there is only one tree of life. The explorers who looked for Fountain of Youth in the new world were just as mistaken as we are when we look for life in our hobbies and careers. Life only comes from one tree.

Turn back to the cross; turn back to its healing. Jesus Christ is true life, and all who eat of him live forever (Jn. 6:51). Do not waste your energy pursuing life in other places, but let his life fill you so that you bring it with you into your work and hobbies and habits. After all, those who receive his life become sources of it for others (Jn. 7:38).

Steven+

Scripture Reflections

“Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns.
7 Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory,
for the marriage of the Lamb has come,
and his Bride has made herself ready;
8 it was granted her to clothe herself
with fine linen, bright and pure”—
for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints. (Rev. 19:6b-8)

This passage from Sunday has a verse that contains nearly an entire biblical doctrine in a nutshell. Like diamonds, verses like this aren’t common, but worth finding! In this instance, the doctrine is sanctification and the verse is number 8.

It was granted her—
Sanctification is given by God, not earned or possessed by us. Everything right that we do is a gift, and so our response to our own godliness should be humility and thanksgiving, not pride. Unless God moves first, we can’t move towards him. He deserves the credit for every place and time we have responded rightly to his commands.

To clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure—
One of the targets for our growth in godliness is beautiful purity. This part of the doctrine of sanctification is unpopular today, but the Bible does not hesitate to say that we are to pursue purity. John claims that everyone who hopes to see God “purifies himself as [God] is pure” (I Jn. 3:3). Paul prayed for hearts that were “blameless in holiness” for the Thessalonians (I Th. 3:13). Purity of every sort—our thoughts (Phil. 4:8-9), our conversations and jokes (Eph. 5:4), our sexual practices (I Cor. 6:18-20)—is not optional, but something the church is supposed to be striving towards at all times.

The righteous deeds—
Sanctification is less complicated than it sometimes appears. We are not called to change our whole being. We can’t change our hearts, try as we might! Instead, we are simply called to obey in specific actions, and trust that the Spirit will transform our hearts. Righteous deeds—small acts of obedience—are all that is asked of us. This means both more freedom and more rigor. It means more freedom because it is not our job to change our hearts or fix ourselves (or our spouses or children!). But we also need to be more rigorous, because little acts of obedience (like telling the truth when it hurts or refusing to grumble, slander, and gossip) are more important than we realize—they are how we grow in holiness before God.

There is more that can be said about sanctification, but the final word today comes from verse 7. God calls us to sanctification not because he values perfection for perfection’s sake or is a killjoy, but instead because we are preparing for a wedding. We will be joined to Jesus Christ in joy forever, and we are called to prepare for this like a bride preparing for her wedding day!

Steven+