“Beat the gospel into heads continually”

Tony Reinke Cross of Christ, Cross-centered life, Preaching, spurgeon

coke-machine

To a group of pastors in London, Tim Keller explained the inner workings of an old Coke machine in his Manhattan apartment building. After inserting the proper coinage, Keller explained, you must pound the side of the machine with your fist. After a couple of smacks the coins can be heard trickling down into the heart of the machine. A Coke falls into the bottom tray. Without beating the side of the machine, the coins don’t settle and the Coke will not fall.

Keller takes this metaphor into the pulpit. While preaching, he thinks of his audience as an assembly of Coke machines. His audience needs a little pound on the side of the head to get the truth of the gospel to sink into the heart and to produce spiritual fruit. He laughs when he says this, but the point is true.

Luther knew this centuries ago. He wrote,

“Here I must take counsel of the gospel. I must hearken to the gospel, which teacheth me, not what I ought to do, (for that is the proper office of the law), but what Jesus Christ the Son of God hath done for me: to wit, that He suffered and died to deliver me from sin and death. The gospel willeth me to receive this, and to believe it. And this is the truth of the gospel. It is also the principal article of all Christian doctrine, wherein the knowledge of all godliness consisteth. Most necessary it is, therefore, that we should know this article well, teach it unto others, and beat it into their heads continually.” *

I am thankful to God that I am surrounded by pastors, friends, and a wife who are skilled at swinging the gospel hammer. I’m always in need of it.

So who swings the gospel hammer in your life?

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* Martin Luther, St. Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians (Smith, English & Co. 1860), p. 206.

Photo © RedMorris

Jonathan Edwards on God’s Grand Design

Tony Reinke τέλος, Jonathan Edwards

wedding

During one Sunday morning sermon in the winter of 1744, Jonathan Edwards articulated what he understood to be the culmination of all God’s works. Admittedly a lofty goal for a single sermon.

Edwards titled his message “Approaching the End of God’s Grand Design” and chose Revelation 21:6 as the text—“And he said unto me, It is done.” He believed this text revealed the τέλος, the end. Edwards argued that all of God’s activities will one day culminate and be fully achieved in a single goal. The divine work of creation, providence, and redemption all point to one grand design. It all points to a wedding.

Edwards’ sermon is worth quoting at length:

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DOCTRINE. There is a time coming when God’s grand design in all his various works and dispensations from age to age will be completed and his end fully obtained… What is this one great design that God has in view in all his works and dispensations?

Ans. ‘Tis to present to his Son a spouse in perfect glory from amongst sinful, miserable mankind, blessing all that comply with his will in this matter and destroying all his enemies that oppose it, and so to communicate and glorify himself through Jesus Christ, God-man. This I take to be the great design of the work of creation [and the] work of providence…

…because it was a spouse to communicate his goodness to that he desired, therefore that she might be one fit not to give but receive good, one was pitched upon that was remarkably empty and poor in herself, not of the highest order of creatures, but mankind—and not man in his first and best estate, but in a fallen, miserable, helpless state: a state wherein his emptiness and need of goodness did more remarkably appear. And because it was his design to communicate his goodness, therefore that he might do it the more fully, those were chosen that were unworthy; because the more unworthy the more is free goodness exercised, and so Christ’s end the more answered in his seeking a spouse to communicate of his goodness to. Hence, not the angels but the miserable race, [the] ruined, sinful race of mankind, was pitched upon.

And because the design was that Christ should communicate goodness, therefore such an one was chosen that needed that Christ should suffer, and it was the will of Christ to suffer because suffering is the greatest expression of goodness and manifestation of kindness. The great design was that Christ in this way should procure or obtain this his spouse, bring her to come to him, present her to himself and make her perfectly beautiful, perfectly and unspeakably happy. Ephesians 5:25, “[Christ] loved the church and gave himself for it.” And this is the way that God the Father intended to glorify his Son: the world was created that from thence Christ might obtain this spouse. This was God’s portion and inheritance, [his] first fruits, his jewel, [his] darling. This was the great gift of God to the Son in the eternal work of redemption, the great promise of God to Christ, the joy set before him. These things seem very manifest by the holy Scripture, and God the Father in this way glorifies himself by thus glorifying his Son, Jesus Christ.

This spouse of Christ is that part of the creation which God has made for his glory in an eminent manner. Isaiah 43:7, “Everyone that is called by my name: for I have created [him] for my glory.” This is the way in which God presents elect men to him, viz. by presenting them to Christ. Being presented to Christ in perfect glory, Christ will present them to the Father. In subserviency to this design of thus presenting {the elect} are all things in heaven and earth managed, and that through all the varieties of God’s dispensations.

The great war that has been maintained between God [and] his enemies for the biggest part of six thousand years has been about that design. This is the design the elect angels were made to be subservient to, and this is the design about which is the continual opposition of the reprobate angels; and there is a very great probability that their first sin by which they fell was their opposing God in this affair. And ’tis probably also that special work to which the angels were appointed as the trial of their obedience. The eternal destruction of God’s enemies, both of devils and wicked men, is in subserviency to the design of his glorifying himself in his church in the manner that has been spoken of.

[He will] glorify his majesty, power [and] justice before his elect that they might behold the glory and so be happy in the sight of this glory of God, and that they might give God the glory due to him on this account, and that they might be the more sensible of the worth of {their} happiness and of the wonderfulness and sovereignty of God’s grace.

Thus the grand design of God in all his works and dispensations is to present to his Son a spouse in perfect purity, beauty and glory from amongst [mankind], blessing all [the elect] and destroying those [that oppose], and so to glorify himself through his Jesus Christ, God-man; or in one word, the work of redemption is the grand design of [history], this the chief work of God, [the] end of all other works, so that the design of God is one. Hence all the decrees of God are spoken of in Scripture as one purpose which God purposed in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 1:9–11). All decrees may one way or other be referred to the covenant of redemption: the grand subject of [the] revelations that God hath made, [the] subject of the words of God, [the] subject of prophecy, [the] great things insisted on in the contemplations and praises of saints and angels, and will be to all eternity.”

—Jonathan Edwards, sermon “Approaching The End Of God’s Grand Design,” in The Works of Jonathan Edwards: Sermons and Discourses, 1743—1758 (Vol. 25), pages 111—126. Paragraph breaks were added for readability.

A sampling of biblical texts on this marriage for personal meditation include Isaiah 54:5, 61:10, 62:5, Hosea 2:19—20, Matthew 22:1—14, 25:1—14, John 3:25—30, Ephesians 5:22—33, Revelation 19:6—10, 21:1—9 (notice Edwards’ sermon text is sandwiched here between v. 2 and v. 9).

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Photo © 2009, ronsho

The Pilgrim’s Progress (now in living color)

Tony Reinke BR > Crossway, John Bunyan

I named my second son after John Bunyan (1628—1688). Bunyan is a literary giant from the Puritan era. His classic book, The Pilgrim’s Progress, is one of the best selling books of all time and has undergone dozens of editions and translations over the centuries. The newest version is set to hit bookstores at the end of September in a deluxe, updated, 240-page, colorfully illustrated version from Crossway ($16.49 over at Amazon).

The book’s text has been edited and updated by C. J. Lovik and the book’s 30 illustrations were contributed by award winning painter Michael Wimmer. As the release date approaches for this book I’ll have a full review. But for now, I wanted to post two illustrations. Crossway permitted me a sneak peak into the book a few days ago. Here is an exclusive look at two of the paintings.

Pilgrim's-Progress-18

Illustration copyright © 2009 by Michael Wimmer. Posted by permission of the publisher. The Pilgrim’s Progress: From This World to That Which Is to Come (Crossway 2009), p. 18.

Pilgrim's-Progress-129

Illustration copyright © 2009 by Michael Wimmer. Posted by permission of the publisher. The Pilgrim’s Progress: From This World to That Which Is to Come (Crossway 2009), p. 129.

Nice illustrations! … I’ll have more for you in a later review.

My favorite (used)bookstore

Tony Reinke spurgeon

OMAHA, NE—My favorite used bookstore is an unkept mess. It’s the neighbor to a tattoo parlor and a bar—an unlikely location for literature.

Inside, the bookstore is drastically underlit to begin with and smoky from all the cigarettes burned by the owner at his junk-strewn desk. The fire chief would not be happy. Bookshelves stretch 15 feet into the sky, far out of reach of customers and to an altitude that makes the spines illegible (except for the oversized tomes). The owners have stuffed the overflow book stock wherever they find open air, either horizontally over jammed shelving or—what appears to be the favorite option—in piles of books strewn on the floor. This overflow further congests the tight walkways. To view the recent additions to the store, shoppers must humble themselves on one knee and squat down to the floor level to view the spines. Other shoppers step over each other as the walkways. Just by posture you can determine whether someone is new to the store or a frequent visitor. The curiosity of a newbie will be satisfied by walking upright. The frequent shoppers snail along at floor level.

This makes me question who is prioritized in the store landscape. Is it the frequent shoppers or the books? And will there come a point in the store when there is no longer room for the shoppers and it becomes a pool of books with no outflow? How many more books must be added to the collection until the morning unlocking of the store will include a routine avalanche of books pouring out from the front door and out upon the sidewalk and into the street?

I have friends who despise such used bookstores and will never buy or read a used book. They watch too much Seinfeld. I love used bookstores, and especially this one.

Vacationing, planning, writing

Tony Reinke spurgeon

For the next two weeks I am vacationing with my wife and kids. It will be a loooong road trip (1,250 miles each way) and I’d appreciate your prayers for safety. We are presently in Nebraska and enjoying the unseasonably tolerable July weather.

jon+babeOne of the road trip highlights was our stop at the Bob Feller museum in VanMeter, Iowa. Housed at this museum are all types of uniforms and baseballs from Feller’s hall of fame pitching career in baseball. Included is the bat that Babe Ruth leaned on in 1948 during his famous farewell photo taken at Yankee Stadium shortly before his death. The Yanks were playing Cleveland that day and somehow Ruth grabbed Feller’s bat. Cool to see such a treasure of baseball lore buried in a tiny farm town hidden by the Iowa countryside. After leaving the little museum we stumbled upon the high school baseball field and my son and I tossed a ball for about an hour. Surely Feller learned to throw a fastball here on this grass. I yelled across the field to my wife who was setting out lunch on a picnic table, “Is this heaven?”

As time has allowed on this trip I’ve been using the downtime during this vacation to write and finalize a book proposal. While I cannot yet reveal the book’s topic, I mention it for your prayerful support. I’ll be submitting my proposal to the publisher within the next month and find myself in need of your prayers (as always).

And because one or two of you care, here were the three books I chose to bring along on summer vacation:

I’ll blog as time allows (which may be infrequently until I return to D.C.). I appreciate your prayers.

Off to a day at the zoo.

Tony