My Boy

Tony Reinke spurgeon

At my son’s school each week the class celebrates one of the students with what is called “all about me” week. It’s a fun idea and a great opportunity for kids in the class to share their interests and get acquainted with one another over the course of the year.  It also provides an opportunity for parents to encourage their child by writing a letter about what they most appreciate in their child. This letter is read by the teacher to the class.

This week was dedicated to my son, it was a “all about Jonathan” week. The following letter I wrote was read to the class yesterday is here posted for any family and friends who are interested. This is a letter about my precious boy, my firstborn son, my baseball buddy, Jonathan:

February 26, 2009

Hello, 2nd grade class.

This is Mr. Reinke, Jonathan’s dad. So, this week is “all about Jonathan” week, and you want me to share things I appreciate about my son. Hmm, let me see.

As you know, Jonathan loves baseball. At home he likes to flip through black and white photographs of old baseball players like Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Ted Williams, and Cy Young. Jonathan collects baseball cards, too. His binder of baseball cards is completely full (and weighs about 20 pounds). He likes to learn about baseball and has read several long chapter books about the game and some of its greatest players.

Speaking of baseball, Jonathan and I attend as many Major League baseball games as possible, especially when our favorite team, the Boston Red Sox, travels to Baltimore. Jonathan loves to arrive early at Camden Yards, snaking his way through the crowd with his baseball glove on his hand, seeking to find a good place in the front row of the center field bleachers—which provides a good view of the players swinging at batting practice, and the best chance of catching a ball. A few times Jonathan has come close to catching a warm-up home run ball. Mostly, it’s just fun to watch one of Jonathan’s favorite power hitters on the Boston Red Sox—“Big Papi” David Ortiz—smack practice pitches into orbit, baseballs that that rocket into the air and over our heads and deep into the bleachers.

And Jonathan is a skilled baseball player himself. When he pitches his fastball, the catcher’s mitt pops loudly. Maybe he will grow up to be a pitcher. He can hit the ball hard, too, but not quite as far as Big Papi. But he is the power hitter on his little league team. I call him “Little Papi.”

Jonathan also loves to be out in nature, to be buried deep in the woods—so deep you cannot see anything but trees, rocks, and the sky. I once watched Jonathan hike up the slippery rock face of Cunningham Falls with a walking stick and a heavy backpack. It was quite a feat. And he really loves to hike along the Billy Goat Trail along the Potomac river in Great Falls National Park. I have a picture of Jonathan standing on a huge bolder with his hand over his eyes, shielding the sun from his face, and looking off into the distance. What the picture does not show is that the large boulder was close to the edge of a tall rock-faced cliff edge that dropped straight down about 100 feet into the river. Like a cougar, finding his way through the woods comes naturally to Jonathan. I appreciate this about him.

Speaking of animals, Jonathan likes to wrestle me in the living room. In the past I could take him down to the carpet for an easy pin, but over the past two years Jonathan has become much more of a challenge—now able to outsmart my tactics a bit, and strong enough to break loose from my pins. Eventually I can always win, but I doubt my winning streak will last too much longer.

I admit this next thing is a bit random. Jonathan’s favorite drink from Starbucks is white hot chocolate. When we are not playing or watching baseball, wrestling, or hiking, Jonathan and I bring 20 books with us to Starbucks and we will spread those books out on one of those little round tables, drink our drinks, and read for a couple hours. Not as exciting as standing on the edge of a cliff, but I really appreciate this about my son.

But as much as I appreciate all these things about my son, I most appreciate Jonathan’s love of Jesus. A long time ago, in a clothing store at a mall, Jonathan was playing with a little boy whose parents were also shopping. I overheard him say to this boy, “But toys will not make you happy. Only Jesus makes you happy.” Jonathan is willing to tell other boys and girls about Jesus because he loves Jesus himself.

Jonathan is always willing and eager to pray to God for his friends. Jonathan is quick to pray for you—his classmates and teacher. He prays for his classmates at night when we gather as a family, and he prays each morning for Miss D as we drive in to school. I love this about my son.

I could go on with things I appreciate about Jonathan.

We love him.

Sincerely,

Mr. Reinke

Reading Digest #4 (Feb. 26, 2009)

Tony Reinke .Reading Digest

SCRIPTURE …

Judges. I am currently reading through this OT book very slowly, traversing this period of the Warlords with a trusty handbook (Bruce Waltke’s chapter in An Old Testament Theology).

Psalms. My goal is to read and meditate on a single Psalm each week, reading Derek Kidner’s commentary, gleaning personal edification from each chapter, and writing my meditations into a short essay. Currently meditating on Psalm 5 (essays completed on Psalms 1—4).

CURRENTLY READING …

The Christology of John Owen by Richard Daniels (10%, 4.00 stars). Whenever I feel a bit smug in my theological knowledge I turn to Puritan John Owen to get rocked a bit. And I don’t mean rocked as in the fun experience of attending a live jam-band concert; I mean rocked as in the stinging bite of feeling stupid. Daniels has written a masterful comprehensive Christology of Owen’s writings. To balance, I’ve been reading slowly from Owen (1:374-389).

The Complete Works of Francis A. Schaeffer, Volume 3: A Christian View of Spirituality (10%, 3.80 stars). On his blog recently, Justin Taylor quoted from the book, No Little People, and my friend CB is reading True Spirituality. Schaeffer, I believe, was at his best behind the pulpit. Both books are comprised of sermons delivered at L’Abri and are included in volume 3 of Schaeffer’s works. My devo time has been richly reward by these sermons/books.

A. Lincoln: A Biography by Ronald C. White, Jr. (15%, 3.00 stars). A spanking new, highly endorsed, biography of president Lincoln. A hearty 900-page volume that I expect will be worth the time! Note to self: White will be in D.C., May 16-17.

The Agony and the Ecstasy: A Biographical Novel of Michelangelo by Irving Stone (10%, 2.50 stars). The ornamented world of Renaissance Italy is recreated by Stone in this ‘historical novel,’ praised for its research and historical detail (the author studied all 495 known letters written by Michelangelo). The author zooms in from the period to focus on the artistic tensions and life of M., whose sculpting is genius and a small miracle. His aristocratic family was not keen on the idea of son pursuing art, his father apparently hated the idea of a son working with his hands, and was appalled that he would chip rocks with a chisel. Sculpting had passed its height in Italy and there were no gifted sculptor mentors. Yet M. followed his inner conviction that he was created to sculpt. A captivating story of divine artistic gifting.

Unpacking Forgiveness: Biblical Answers for Complex Questions and Deep Wounds by Chris Brauns (50%, ^3.50 stars). Good book on how Christians forgive others. Written with immediate application in mind. Explains the fascinating (and I think biblical) concept of forgiving others for their sin only when they ask for forgiveness and not before.

Our Reasonable Faith by Herman Bavinck (30%, 5.00 stars). My favorite condensed systematic theology noted for its theological splendor and for moments of breakout doxology. Bavinck is my homeboy and this is my go-to volume for rich, slow-paced theological learning. If you see me at Starbucks, I’ll probably have this volume with me.

Artful Sentences: Syntax as Style by Virginia Tufte (35%, 3.40 stars). Collection of over 1,000 sentences from the writings of the modern literary greats, organized topically, with syntactical exegesis to expound the stylistic construction of each sentence. I love the organization, the format, and the depth of explanation. Few books on style are as valuable. Artful Sentences is a rare book that excels at explaining abstract style within concrete examples straight from the pages of modern literature. You’ve seen this book on my list for a while and it’s not a book I’m trying to complete quickly.

RECENTLY COMPLETED …

The God Who Smokes: Scandalous Meditations on Faith by Timothy J. Stoner (100%, 3.20 stars). Stoner is a very snappy writer, plainly discussing the blunt side of Scripture with a raw honesty I appreciate. Stoner makes no apology about the complexity of God’s character; God is a blazing furnace that singes mountains and a tender and merciful father that welcomes prodigal sons home. Few books better present the hard things of God more honestly and openly while at the same time directing the reader to the cross and the unshaken love and kindness of the Lord towards His children.

Halls of Fame: Essays by John D’Agata (70%, 2.80 stars). D’Agata is the most imaginative essayists I have ever read, blending short form, loose poetry, and unique prose together until they dissolve into a single artful style. Not written from a Christian worldview.

Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us by Seth Godin (100%, ^3.00 stars). Good book about online (and offline) leadership and how to use it to help others achieve their goals. Groups stand around together, tribes communicate and provoke one another. How do leaders harness the potential of these online tribes and lead them via Web 2.0—blogs, Facebook, Twitter. Will re-read soon in a study group to refocus one of my ministry initiatives.

Getting Things Done by David Allen (60%, 4.30 stars). The classic book on personal planning and time management. I have recently implemented a computer-based system to help organize projects and have seen the fruit (OmniFocus). Allen helps clarify for me the conceptual framework of how best to utilize this and other tools of organization.

Uprooting Anger: Biblical Help For a Common Problem by Robert D. Jones. (80%, ^3.90 stars). Anger may manifest itself as red-hot or ice-cold. Anger is the manifestation of sin rooted in selfish unmet desires, fears, idols, comforts, passions etc (James 4). Very helpful book.

ON THE DOCKET …

Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling by Andy Crouch. Dipped into this book on a recent flight, long enough to know this is a book I want to read cover-to-cover.

A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. Because Andrew is reading it now and I refuse to be less informed than Andrew.

What Adam Lacked

Tony Reinke Assurance, Cross of Christ, Cross-centered life

Before sin slithered silently through the open gate, the Garden of Eden was perfect. Adam had his own flawless wife, a garden without blemish, and the responsibility to subdue and cultivate his spacious, well-watered, rural setting.

Adam possessed much. He worked a great job. He enjoyed a perfect marriage. He was at peace with all of creation—no tornadoes, no drought, no pollution, no death, no sickness, no tears. So what could be lacking?

From the beginning, the purity of the garden, the peace among the animals, his relationship with his wife—even Adam’s own life—were all conditioned, conditioned upon his faithfulness to God’s will. God’s will was not demanding, was it? There for the enjoyment of the couple was a small forest of fruit trees, that produced more fruit than probably could be consumed. Only one tree was forbidden and nothing in this single condition diminished Adam’s joy in any way.

But this condition represents something big because it points to the one thing Adam could not possess in the Garden of Eden—certainty.

The condition meant that Adam’s perfect marriage was delicate, the climate of the perfect garden climate was fragile, Adam’s future in the garden was uncertain, and even the duration of his now perfect and potentially eternal body was questionable. Every piece of his situation could be shattered by a single decision divergent from God’s will. And we know that in one single bite this fragility swept into the garden to steal away the innocence. As the jaw of a perfect man clamped down on the fruit that represented man’s disobedience, sin plunged the dagger in man’s idyllic world, and creation fell into a swirling chaos of pain, the beginning pains of the disorder that is the matrix in which we live and breathe.

But here is the amazing fact.

What distinguishes the pre-fall Adam in the perfect garden from me, a post-fall sinner redeemed by the blood of Christ, is as wide as the distinction between uncertainty and certainty. Certainty is God’s gift He gives His children in Christ. Sure, we lack the paradise now, but we do not lack the certainty. Those who have placed their faith in Christ are safe and certain in Christ’s protective power, immune from all the threats in life that could never shake us from eternal life with our Father (cf. John 10:22-30, Rom 8:38-39).

How can this be? How can a sinless man live with temporal uncertainty and a sinful man live with eternal certainty? Simple. Christ is our obedience. It was our uncertainty that was put to the test in the wilderness temptations, it was our certainty on the line when Christ was tempted in every way throughout his 33 year life. It was at every moment, in every thought, deed, and desire that our certainty was tested. Christ was without sin. He was the perfect Savior! And He could say the words that Adam never could—It is finished.

And because we are united to Christ, because he lived without sin, because he lived a life under the law to perfection, he becomes our certainty. The perfect life and death of Christ represents the completion of a perfect life—no sinful actions, no sinful thoughts, no sinful decisions. Once complete, a life of perfection brings with it perfect certainty.

Whatever spectacular dreams we entertain of Eden—and it certainly was a paradise beyond anything we can experience in this life—we possess in the gospel something foreign to Adam’s pre-fall experience. May we thank our Savior for this precious gift of eternal assurance, the one thing even a sinless and perfect garden could not promise.

Whiter Than Snow: Meditations on Sin and Mercy

Tony Reinke BR > Crossway, Cross of Christ, Cross-centered life, Gospel, Paul David Tripp, Sin, spurgeon

9781433502309Surely one of the most valuable gifts God has given the church are surgeons of the soul. Men capable of cutting with the sharp edge of scripture, separating the outward surface of the torso, cutting through the muscle and spreading the chest, looking for the most dangerous problems, those not obvious on the outside, surgeons with determination to find the source of a deep root, a deadly problem found in the now exposed heart, a sin that can be cured only through precise wisdom and the sober application of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And if you can find one of these surgeons—one who knows his way around the deep inner workings of the heart, one who can scale to the very heights of the glorious gospel, and one who is a gifted communicator, able to write his words carefully for the benefit of us all—you have uncovered a gem.

Paul David Tripp is one of these treasures.

In his book Whiter Than Snow: Meditations on Sin and Mercy (Crossway, 2008), Tripp has written for us, partly in prose and partly in poetry, 52 brief devotional pieces that cover the scope of Psalm 51—covering the many contours of David’s sin with Bathsheba, and the experience of God’s grace in light of David’s sin. If you are brave enough to go under the surgeon’s knife, Tripp will guide you to see the darkness of sin at work in your own heart, before skillfully applying the restorative grace of the gospel.

There are a number of excerpts I want to share, but the one that I return to most often is a poem that recounts the ministry of Nathan in confronting David for his sin (see 2 Samuel 12:1-15). In part Tripp writes:

…Just a humble prophet
Telling a simple story
A sinner with a sinner
Not standing above
Alongside, together
Wanting to be an instrument
Hoping to assist a blind man to see
But no trust in self
Speaking calmly
Speaking simply
And letting God
Do through a familiar example
Painted with plain words
What only God can do
Crack the hard-shell heart
Of a wayward man
And make it feel again
See again
Cry again
Pray again
Plead again
Hope again
Love again
Commit again
To a new and better way. (p. 63-64)

Tripp’s poem is a beautiful epigraph upon the granite of Nathan’s legacy. And a video of the author reading from this chapter is available online. Enjoy:

Title: Whiter Than Snow: Meditations on Sin and Mercy
Author: Paul David Tripp
Boards: paper
Pages: 154
Topical index: no
Scriptural index: no
Text: perfect type
Publisher: Crossway
Year: 2008
Price USD: $12.99 / $8.96 at Westminster
ISBNs: 9781433502309, 1433502305

Psalm 4: The Who

Tony Reinke Psalms

In the evening when my wife and kids gather for dinner, I throw out theology-loaded questions to gauge where my children are at spiritually, and and to see where I can improve as a father. I chuckle at their cute little responses and we work through the answers together.

Our 7-year-old son can field questions like a reformed little league all-star, already thinking a bit like the man he was named after (Jonathan Edwards), already asking and working through questions (like: why is it not selfish for God to love Himself above all others?). But it’s the open theism tendencies of my closet arminian 3-year-old daughter that leave me concerned (not to mention the open-fisted carbohydrate hurling of my 18-month-old switch-pitching son that leaves me covered in gravy.)

So I continue to ask questions.

Last Wednesday night, the question that joined the chicken casserole out on the table was this: For Christians, what promises to deliver joy? We all know that we should be joyful, but why? How?

I rephrased the question a bit for my daughter: If God took away all our stuff, would we be happy? Could we be happy?

“No,” she said without pause.

So I asked the question again to see if a moment of reflection would help her formulate a more detailed answer.

“No,” she said.

“Why not?” I asked.

“Because we could not be happy because we have no things.” You needed to be there to hear the words for yourself to get the full cuteness factor.

I appreciate my daughter’s response for its honesty (and for the way she answers questions with multiple uses of the word because in each sentence). She was born with this materialism because her dad passed this tendency along to her, a dad who sometimes acts as though his happiness was tethered to the amount of stuff he possesses.

And I think each of us are born with this Asaph-complex, the tendency to gauge God’s favor towards us, and therefore define our personal joy, by material prosperity and circumstances (Psalm 73).

So can we be happy if God takes away all our stuff—or even worse?

In this Psalm, David was surrounded by trials and temptations and loss. David was cornered, he was hunted by his own son who usurped his throne, he was both the target of slander and defenseless to it, he was pierced with the hot lead of gossip fired from the barrel of loose tongues, he was humiliated publicly, he was surrounded by lies that further undermined his authority, and he was even brought down low by his friends, who became a cloud of doom further darkening his life.

This Psalm perplexes those of us in a western materialistic climate, because despite experiencing the loss of everything, David was filled with joy. He had joy because he had God.

Communion with God was David’s joy, a joy untouched by the slander, untouched by the loss, untouched by the outward gloom, a sweet fellowship enjoyed in reflection and prayer in the quiet peacefulness of night, those dark hours when the terror of anxiety often breaks into the silence with piercing screams to steal and destroy joy, moments now calmed for communion with God.

It was God who deposited this joy in David’s heart, a joy similar to the joy filling the heart during times of material abundance and prosperity, but a different joy altogether, a joy untethered from physical comforts, untethered from the approval of others, untethered from the plunge of Wall Street.

We, too, can find this joy if we find it in God, as we walk in God’s Word, as we know Him, as we love Him, as we delight in His goodness. And as we walk this path, joy, untouchable by circumstances, fills our hearts.

It is a good thing, and rightly do we enjoy, a bank account with money, a table with food, and several pair of clothes. These gifts each flow from God’s generosity towards each of us. But the possessions are small, temporary gifts compared to the fountain of joy He offers us.

To have God as our own, being united to Him through the death of His Son on the cross, is to possess the source of all joy, not merely enjoying temporary gifts, but to directly enjoy God, who is the source of our “infinite, self-sufficient, all-sufficient, essential, overflowing good” (Edwards).

This is the one secret to joy and happiness that you will not find printed in 40-point fluorescent green font on the cover of a magazine cover in the check-out line at the grocery store:

Get God, then seek Him all of your days, and discover with the Psalmist that the source of eternal joy is not in the what, it’s in the Who.

———–

Quote from Works of Jonathan Edwards (Yale) 10:383.