The Pastors' Corner

Body Life

In 1972 the words “body life” sprang into widespread use as a description of the church operating on the principles of Ephesians 4. Spiritual gifts and how they work moved into the center of evangelical life. This wasn’t because the Bible is silent about the way congregations should function. The New Testament epistles are filled with instruction, exhortation, and commands for local churches to live out unity and diversity. The body of Christ is made up of believers who have been gifted by the Holy Spirit to serve and build up one another in the faith. There is no Christian who has not been gifted.

The best way to grasp the significance of what it means to be vitally connected to other believers in Jesus Christ is to track the “one-another” passages in the New Testament. There are thirty-one of these how-to-treat-one-another. We will look at seven of them. They tell us what life in the faith community should be like.

We are members of one another (1 Cor. 12:20; Rom. 12:5). The idea here is that believers are interdependent. We need one another in order to be built up in the faith.  When we were saved we did not become shipwrecked, as it were, on some uninhabited island (saved but all alone).  Christ’s people are connected to one another and cannot grow effectively in isolation from one another. Each of us profits from what the other members in the body of Christ contribute by their ministry of the gifts and graces of the Spirit. Are you involved in the life of this church or are you disconnected from fellow believers? The question here is not, “Do you attend church on Sunday?” If you do, that’s good. But there is more to it than that.  How are you serving others Sunday to Sunday?  In our culture “finding oneself” is seen as a soul journey of peeling back the layers of who I am.  According to Scripture Christians finds themselves by knowing God and being members one of another in the body of Christ (Rom. 12:5).

We are to love one another (Rom. 12:10; 1 Jn. 3:11). Over eighteen times this kind of one-anothering appears in the New Testament, more than any of the others. If the church is to function like it ought to, it must be a place where Christians love one another. It is part of the family tie. It is called brotherly love. We have a common Father, common Son, and common Holy Spirit. We share a common spiritual life in Christ. This is the basic concept of fellowship. We share something. The evidence to the non-Christian that Christ is real to us is our love for one another (Jn. 13:34). Body life is a church life where we are laying down our lives for one another. Love looks around and takes notice of people. It looks for ways to be helpful, kind, and encouraging. Love sacrifices one’s time for the joy of teaching a class of four and five year olds. Love responds in measurable ways to those in need. One of the plagues on modern congregational life is church-hopping.  Love for one another doesn’t run away from people because of personality clashes. When offenses occur love seeks reconciliation.

We are to honor one another (Rom. 12:10). Eugene Peterson in the “Message” paraphrases this, “practice playing second fiddle.” A vibrant body life is occurring when we take the lead in expressing appreciation for the life and work of fellow believers. We know what honors day is like at the end of the school year. It is a time when credit is given to whom credit is due. When we are primarily interested in promoting ourselves, our ideas, and our opinions things are going to turn ugly. Being considerate of the views and opinions of others even when we disagree with them is one way of honoring one another. Do we listen when others are talking? Do we express appreciation for the service of others? Parents and children should honor one another. Speak with a respectful tone of voice. If your child forgets and leaves his Bible on the playground respond by attacking the problem not the child. When the blood of biblical truth is flowing through the veins of body life there will be gracious recognition of what others are doing for Christ’s sake.

Dr. Howard E. Dial
Berachah Bible Church

Pride – A Fight to the Finish

What fault is it in human nature that makes those perceived to be guilty of it very unpopular?  What fault is it that we are more unconscious of in ourselves than any other?  The answer is pride.  C. S. Lewis in his essay on “The Great Sin” offers the unsettling assessment that “Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that , are mere fleabites in comparison” to pride.  Some theologians have even gone so far as to assert that pride is the very essence of sin.  That’s close.  The essential nature of sin is best understood as, in the words of Millard Erickson, “failure to let God be God.”  In other words, unbelief is the ultimate spiritual felony.  Erickson says further, “Anyone who truly believes God to be what he says he is will accord to him his rightful status.  Failure to do so is sin.”  Where does pride fit into this?  It is the other side of unbelief.  Pride is an attitude of independence from God.  It is self-worship.  It is the sin that makes God seem irrelevant.

The question with regard to pride, according to Stuart Scott, is not “Do I have it?” but “Where is it?” and “How much of it do I have?”  One of the reasons the degree of our pride may elude us is how it is camouflaged.  It can hide under the cover of serving others, giving, church attendance, witnessing, and even prayer.  Jesus unmasked the pride of those who practice their righteousness before people to be noticed by them (Matt. 6:1).

Pride is a devilish thing.  It brought about Satan’s fall (Isa. 14:12-17; 1 Tim. 3:6).  Peter denied his Lord because of pride (Jn. 13:37).  Haman was hung on his own gallows because of it (Esther 5-7).  Uzziah spent the last years of his life with leprosy because of it (2 Chron. 26:16-19).  Nebuchadnezzar was afflicted with a serious mental disorder because of it (Dan. 4:30-34).  Pride deceives the heart (Jer. 49:16), hardens the mind (Dan. 5:20), brings contention (Prov. 13:10), ruins churches (Rev. 3:17), stirs up strife (Prov. 28:25).  God hates it (Prov. 16:5, 17).

Like an infectious disease pride creates discontent, ingratitude, presumption, rudeness, bigotry, and the lust for power.  That is why C. S. Lewis said that “there is nothing that makes a man feel so superior to others as being able to move them about like toy soldiers.”  Are you getting the picture?  Pride is a dragon that must be slain.  It stands in the way of the kind of humble service required of Christ’s followers.  It is vicious in that it “recognizes neither sin nor grace, in fact, pride hammers them flat and discards them” (Cornelius Plantinga, Jr.).

“God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (1 Pet. 4:6).  How is the Christian to go about waging war against the pride bound up in the heart?  In the first place, it must be admitted that one is afflicted with it.  You may not know how much or where it lurks, but it is there.  Ask God to flush it out.  Call out to God to search your heart.  Mean it, and humble yourself before Him when the serpent crawls out from under the rock of self-contentment.  Lewis rightly says, “If anyone would like to acquire humility, I can, I think, tell him the first step.  The first step is to realize that one is proud.  And a biggish step, too.  At least, nothing can be done before it.  If you think you are not conceited, it means you are very conceited indeed.”

Secondly, you can look around the corners of your mind and see if you are overestimating yourself, your talents, abilities, your perceived good job of parenting, your success as a teacher, organizer, you name it.  Then consider the possibility that your pride may be disguised as feigned humility.  Are you under estimating yourself (“I am useless.”  “I am worthless.”) waiting for a pat on the back to affirm that you are much better than you think?

Thirdly, resolve to pour contempt on your pride.  Repent of it, wherever you find it.  Slay vain thoughts (e.g. “what can she teach me?”  “I possess special talents that could be helpful in this church.”  “I am prettier than she is and I am going to get more boys to like me than she has.”).  Fourthly, evaluate patterns in your life that may be influenced by pride (e.g. avoidance of certain people or kinds of people, failure to read the Bible and pray, lack of meaningful involvement in the lives of others).  Pride, like beggar lice, can attach itself to just about anything.

But we must go beyond the dredging work.  It is not enough to discover all the muck of pride in our lives.  Jesus calls His people to humility.  Read the Gospels.  Marvel at the most humble man who ever lived.  How did He relate to people?  What did He do for those who hated Him?  What did He say when He was criticized?  How did He assess Himself as the Servant of God (Mk. 10:45)?  What did He do when His men were competing with one another for position and power (Jn. 13:1-20)?  What did Jesus do when the pressures upon Him where overwhelming (Mk. 1:35; 6:46)?  Look at Jesus long and hard.  See yourself as God sees you.  Don’t try to embellish it with more or less.  And, finally, be ready for the long war.  All of our motives, thoughts, words, deeds, and relationships are honeycombed with the tunnels of pride.  We are in for a fight until we see the Servant of God face to face.

Dr. Howard E. Dial
Berachah Bible Church

“I Now Pronounce You…”

On Wednesday, August 4, 2010, Federal Judge Vaughan Walker took it upon himself to redefine the institution of marriage, God’s creation order and thousands of years of human history notwithstanding.  The San Francisco Chief U.S. District Judge advanced the homosexual agenda in declaring in the name of justice that denying gay couples the right to marry is a violation of the U.S. Constitution.  Make no mistake about it this is a major turn in establishing the normalization of homosexuality.

Contrary to moral fence sitters (e.g. “What threat is homosexual marriage to your marriage?”) much is at stake in the twisted reasoning of Judge Walker.  He claims that “Religious beliefs that gay and lesbian relationships are sinful or inferior to heterosexual relationships harm gays and lesbians.”  This kind of thinking travels under the guise of legal reasoning.  Another “finding” in the Judge’s 138-page opinion is the assertion that “Gender no longer forms an essential part of marriage; marriage under law is a legal union of equal.”  This is astounding.  Moral truth is turned on its head.  Those who disagree with the Judge’s conclusions are viewed as irrational bigots.  Even more brazen is the implication that the God of the universe is in serious error.  What we are living to see is another shameless nail in the coffin of human civilization.

Undoubtedly, Judge Walker’s ruling will be hailed as a moral triumph by many.  The truth is, however, that homosexual activists will not be content until marriage, the central institution of human civilization, is deconstructed and replaced with whatever is right in one’s own eyes.  Moral anarchy will be proclaimed as love and tolerance.

Evil posing as good continues to strut across the stage of human history. As it does we must not forget God’s eternal truth and what the real story is.

1. We live in a sinfully fallen world brought on and perpetuated by human rebellion against a holy and righteous God.
2. The evil of sin will not triumph.  Rulers take counsel against the Lord and attempt to cast away the “fetters” of allegiance to the King of Kings.  But God is not intimidated by His creatures.  Man will answer to his Creator on judgment day (Psa. 2:2, 3; Rev. 20:11-15).
3. All rebels against the Lord and His Anointed, the Son of God, can find pardon by bowing before the cross and the empty tomb.  Sin blinded minds have their only hope in redemption through faith in Jesus Christ (Rom. 3:21-22).
4. The impertinence of protestors against God’s moral law construct their own gallows upon which they hang themselves by the rope of self-conceived moral and ethical values.  Sin cannot bear its own weight.  The grave stones of past civilizations bear witness to the price of human folly (Rom. 1:18-32).
5. The true enemy in life is sin and death.  Homosexual desires, adulterous desires, stealing desires, and all covetousness can be conquered and put to flight by the gospel of Jesus Christ.  The only unforgiveable sin is unbelief.  Our lusts, greed, envy, murder, strife, gossip and a host of other sins nailed Jesus Christ to the cross.
6. Same-sex marriage may become accepted by society.  But it will not be without a terrible price to pay.  Religious liberty hangs in the balances.  How will those be treated who view homosexuality and same-sex marriage as harmful and sinful?  What if society agrees with the legalization of polygamy?

There is hope.  The power of the gospel of Jesus Christ can change lives.  Christians must not forget that the church was born in an idol worshiping, pagan world.  Jesus will build His church.  Sin cannot overpower it.  “Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?  Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.  And such were some of you.  But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God” (1 Cor. 6:9-11).

Dr. Howard E. Dial
Berachah Bible Church

The Resurrected Mind

The first mind was a beautiful mind.  Given about six seconds for each animal, Adam could have easily given names to about 3,00o of the basic kinds of animals.  It is estimated this would have taken about five hours (Dr. Henry Morris, “The Defender’s Study Bible”).  Adam may very well have had the greatest I.Q. of any human who has ever lived.  He was capable of quick analysis and identification.  Adam’s mind was a gift from God. Self-consciousness, reason, volition, and memory distinguished man from animals.  Man could commune with God in whose image he was made. The ability to reason and think logically made it possible for Adam and Eve to communicate with God and one another.

Dutch, our son’s dog, cannot engage in abstract thinking.  We have kept him for several days and have been unable to have any conversation with him.  He has no ethical opinions and has no capacity whatsoever to discuss theology, the news, sports, or the weather.  When Dutch goes back to his home he has never written or called to thank us for taking care of him.  He is a dog.  Animals cannot think and learn.  We human beings made in the image of God can think and learn.

The history of the human mind took a catastrophic turn when Adam and Eve thought they could be like God.  One of the immediate tragic effects of their blatant disobedience was mental trouble.  They didn’t become insane but their minds ceased to function normally. Theologians speak of this as the noetic effects of human sin (noetic, from the Greek nous, “mind”).  Man’s mind became darkened by sin (“darkened in their understanding,” Eph. 4:17).  “There is none who understands” (Rom. 3:11).  Man the sinner acquired a corrupt mind.  The Fall caused the intellect to function irrationally.  This was immediately apparent in the way Adam and Eve attempted to hide from the presence of God (Gen. 3:8).  Shame, confusion, guilt, and fear had taken hold of their thought processes.  Their perception of God and themselves had changed drastically.  God was now seen as their adversary.  They were unwilling to admit their sin and turned on one another.  Fig leaves became their recourse for dealing with guilt.  They were no longer thinking as their Creator had designed them to think.

The sinful mind is a mind that lacks spiritual perception. It cannot assess one’s true condition before a holy God.  It finds no pleasure in God.  The beautiful mind of unfallen man became a mind that does not understand or seek God.  Self-deception distorts fundamental spiritual realities.  Our sin-darkened minds convinces us that a lie is the truth and the truth is a lie (Isa. 5:20).  Human wisdom congratulates itself on how to know God but it gets it all wrong (1 Cor. 1:18-21).  Sin did not destroy man’s intellect or reasoning process.  The fallen, sinful mind is capable of extraordinary intellectual achievements.  Getting a man to the moon, discoveries in quantum physics, and in molecular biology are among many witnesses to the ability of the human mind to explore new frontiers of knowledge.

Is there any hope for the sin-bound mind?  The answer in the words of the apostle Paul is that, “God made foolish the wisdom of the world” (1 Cor. 1:20).  The depraved mind, the blinded mind of unbelievers must see “the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” (Rom. 1:28; 2 Cor. 4:4).  Jesus said, “I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness” (Jn. 12:46).  By the power of the Holy Spirit the mental eyes of unbelievers can be turned “from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God” (Eph. 5:8; 26:18).

The spiritually resurrected mind through conversion to Jesus Christ must begin walking, or should we say working, in newness of life (Rom. 6:4).  God is to be loved with the full exertion of the Christian’s thought life.  All of our mental powers are to be harnessed to the cross.  The new birth sets the mind free from its hostility to God (“Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior” Col. 1:21).  The resurrected mind is free to know God and have its world and life view constructed and informed by God’s Word.  Free thinkers are those who have been liberated from the shackles of unbelief and are having their lives transformed by the renewing of their minds.  Resurrected minds, rejoice!

Dr. Howard E. Dial
Berachah Bible Church

The Gift of Summer

Ah, the lazy, hazy days of  summer.  Long hot days, cicadas serenading, lightning bugs, cold watermelon, peaches, fried okra, fresh corn, butterbeans and tomatoes, thunderstorms, camping trips, swimming in the pool, sunburn, grape popsicles, homemade ice cream, a trip to the beach.

I have fond memories of the summers of my childhood.  Swimming to cool off was always welcome.  There were days spent at Spring Lake (some apartments are in its place now) with a big picnic lunch.  It was so good to dive down deep and feel the cold spring water coming up.  On the way home from the lake we would stop and pick wild plums.  One of the big events of a summer’s week was the arrival of the vegetable man.  A farmer in his old straw hat would drive slowly down the street announcing his presence, “Vegetables!”  Soon the women of the neighborhood would be gathered around his improvised pickup truck loaded with corn, squash, green beans, tomatoes, cantaloupe, okra, butter beans, and watermelons.  His farm was located way off down in the country at a place called Riverdale.  We didn’t know what existed beyond that.

Our summer days were spent in creative outdoor play.  The summer of 1954 was especially memorable.  It was extremely hot and dry remaining the high nineties for days on end (though we kids didn’t care about the numbers).  Of course our house was not air-conditioned nor was anyone else’s house.   Evenings were spent squeezing out every bit of daylight we could.  Fox and the hounds, May-I, swatting lightning bugs, and reading on the front porch were better than entering a hot house.

Church in the summer time had it special challenges for a boy.  The church auditorium was hot.  Funeral fans helped some of the adults.  Bugs came in the windows in the evening service and performed some dazzling aerial displays over the preacher’s head.  The preacher always wore a coat and tie.  We all sweated.  I looked forward to that big vegetable Sunday dinner with fried chicken and ice tea.

Summer is God’s idea.

When the waters of the global flood receded and Noah and his family of seven came off the ark a seasonal climate awaited them.  Cold and heat, summer and winter were God’s surprises (Gen. 8:22).  This was evidence of His dominion over creation, not the capricious behavior of “mother nature.”  Spring and summer occur because God determined that it would be so (Psa. 74:17).  Israel’s pagan neighbors attributed the seasonal cycle to Baal’s liberation from the underworld ruled by death.  The truth is that God established the principle of uniformity for the post-Flood world.  The seasons of the year are gifts from God in a sin-cursed world. The curse upon nature brought the miseries of oppressive heat and humidity, mosquitoes, malaria, and hurricanes.  God promised that there would never be another universal flood but did not eliminate nature’s enslavement to decay and death.  Summer and winter will continue until the earth is renovated and the curse removed altogether (Rev. 22:3).

The psalmist tells us that God made summer to remind us of His infinite wisdom and power (Psa. 74:17).  When times are bad and we feel abandoned by God, we need to get a faith grip on spiritual realities.  Go out doors on a summer day or night and find delight in the thought of God’s creative, sovereign power.  Think about what our Creator has done.  Let the chorus of katydids on a summer’s night lead you to worship the Lord who rules over the sounds and sights of nature’s summer season.  The thunderstorm is God’s doing.  The lightning bug is God’s gift.  What a marvelous creature.  They light up the darkness looking for a mate and we are entertained by their yellow blinking lights.  The same God who has given us the seasons knows what He is doing in our times of suffering.

Summer also serves as time to prepare for winter (Prov. 6:8; 30:25).  We are to learn from the ant.  Preparing for the winters of our life demands the wise use of time and self-discipline.  The harvest ant has an economy which depends largely on seed gathering.  They collect seeds in the growing season for use during the dry season when food is not available.  Therein lies a lesson.  It’s easy to let your guard down in the summer.  Laziness is making the easiest choices which result in procrastination.  Students, are there some things you need to do this summer to prepare for the coming school year; a book to read, money to earn?  Is Dad’s fire wood needed for those cozy winter nights?  Are repairs on the roof necessary for the coming cold, rainy season?

Ah, summer!  What a sweet time it can be even though nature sings in the minor key.  “Thank you Lord for the katydids that sing me to sleep, for soft warm air of a July night, for the vegetables that are growing, for the humming birds whirring around the feeder on the back porch, for the sweet corn and tomatoes to be eaten.  But most of all thank you, Lord, for the reminder that one day nature will be the perfect summer when the Son of God rules over His earthly kingdom, for that day when the rivers will run crystal clear, when fruit will be bountiful, when the plowman will overtake the reaper, when we will make gardens and eat their fruit. So savor the summer.

Dr. Howard E. Dial
Berachah Bible Church

Whose Body Is It?

“It’s my body I can do with it as I please.” This is the thinking of many in our day. Combine with this the belief that man is by classification an animal and you realize the degree of confusion about the origin of the human body.

The human body is a marvelous gift from God. We are, in the words of the psalmist, fearfully and wonderfully made. Each human being is unique because of God, not because of chance. From the raw material of dirt (a humbling reminder), our body chemistry was created. The physical recipe for the body is 65 percent oxygen, 18 per cent carbon, 10 per cent hydrogen, 3 per cent nitrogen, 1 ½ per cent calcium, 1 per cent phosphorus, and 1 ½ per cent of other elements. About seven tenths of the body is water.

God’s language, “dust of the ground,” is a glorious reminder that the human body is the result of direct creation, not evolution. Theistic evolution (the belief that God has used evolution to create man) says that the “dust of the ground” symbolizes the animal kingdom. Such an interpretation contradicts the clear teaching of Genesis 2:7 which says that “man became a living soul.” Until that moment man was inanimate, lifeless matter. Man does not have an animal ancestry. God “formed the man from the dust of the ground” as a potter fashions clay into a particular shape.

Adam’s body received the breath of life. Suddenly there was a fully formed adult male with complete self-consciousness, physical mobility, able to think, talk, and observe his environment. This meant that man was dependent on his Creator for his physical life. Elihu, one of Job’s counselors, knew this when he said, “The Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life” (Job 33:4). In addition to this, man is accountable to God for what he does with human life, his own and that of others. King Nebuchadnezzar, due to his arrogance, had to be rebuked; “But the God in whose hand is your breath, and whose are all your ways, you have not honored” (Dan. 5:23). It is a perilous thing for the creature to exalt himself above the Creator.

Human beings do not have authority over their physical bodies. When man attempts to usurp such authority he is acting as a rebel and must bear the consequences. The ethical issues of abortion, euthanasia, murder, and suicide are subject to this divine principle. Those who preen themselves on the thought that they have a right to do whatever they wish with their bodies are blinded by their conceit.

Men and women do not have autonomous rights over their own bodies. Our eyes, ears, mouths, feet, hands, brains, and sexual organs are God-given and are to be used to fulfill their divinely ordained purposes. Christians, especially, must not forget that “we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done whether good or bad” (2 Cor. 5:10). The physical body, as a gift from God, is to be an instrument of righteousness. With our ears we can hear God’s eternal, infallible, inerrant Word. With our mouths we can proclaim the good news of God’s forgiveness in Jesus Christ. With our feet we can go to those who have never heard about eternal life in Christ. With our taste, touch, and sense of smell we have the ability to understand and enjoy God’s creation. With our minds we can understand God and know Him better.

Dear Christian friend, never let this truth be far from your next thought; “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body” (1 Cor. 6:19-20).

Dr. Howard E. Dial
Berachah Bible Church

Hating Anger

One of the more disturbing battlefronts of sin in my life is that of anger towards my children. Those whom I love the dearest can at times be on the receiving end of my sinful temper. God knows this special temptation for fathers and their children. Through the apostle Paul, we are commanded, “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord” (Eph. 6:4). He has given instruction about children and parents (plural) in verses 1-3. But he narrows in with this specific challenge to dads regarding anger in verse 4. Why does anger so quickly flare up between dads and their kids?

John Piper offers some sound instruction on this:

“In Ephesians 6:4, Paul begins by saying that fathers should not do something. “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger.” Of all the things Paul could have encouraged fathers not to do, he chooses this one. Amazing. Why this one? Why not, Don’t discourage them? Or pamper them? Or tempt them to covet or lie or steal? Or why not, Don’t abuse them? Or neglect them? Or set a bad example for them? Or manipulate them? Of all the things he could have warned fathers against, why this: “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger”?

He doesn’t tell us why. So let me guess from what I know of Scripture and life. I’ll suggest two reasons. First, he warns against provoking anger because anger is the most common emotion of the sinful heart in when it confronts authority. Dad embodies authority. Apart from Christ, the child embodies self-will. And when the two meet, anger flares. A two-year-old throws a tantrum and a teenager slams the door—or worse.

So I think Paul is saying, there is going to be plenty of anger with the best of parenting, so make every effort, without compromising your authority or truth or holiness, to avoid provoking anger. Consciously be there for the child with authority and truth and holiness in ways that try to minimize the response of anger. We’ll come back to how.

The second reason, Paul may focus on not provoking anger in our children is because this emotion devours almost all other good emotions. It deadens the soul. It numbs the heart to joy and gratitude and hope and tenderness and compassion and kindness. So Paul knows that if a dad can help a child not be overcome by anger, he may unlock his heart to a dozen other precious emotions that make worship possible and make relationships sweet.”

He goes on:

“The point I am stressing is this: When Paul says in Ephesians 6:4, “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger,” don’t just stop doing things that provoke anger; start doing things that remove anger—overcome anger. Start doing things that awaken in the heart of a child other wonderful emotions so that they are not devoured by anger—the great emotion eater.

The main task in all this is that you overcome your own anger and replace it with tenderhearted joy – joy that spills over onto your children.  When the mouth of dad is mainly angry, the tender emotions of a child are consumed. In other words, being the kind of father God calls us to be means being the kind of Christian and the kind of husband God calls us to be.”

“A father’s love for his children is to be supernatural and expressed in hundreds of ways. Fathers, God can make it possible for you to be patient beyond yourself by not giving up when your children disappoint you. You won’t reject them or yell at them when they embarrass you in front of others. You will tirelessly answer questions. Fathers with four and five year olds have some special opportunities to show their love toward sons and daughters whose imagination is at its height, who are meeting the challenges of learning to get along with others, and who have boundless energy.

A father’s love is not arrogant. It doesn’t attempt to bully his children into submission by brute force, threats, and the refusal to say I am or “I was wrong, will you forgive me?” Men, we do have a struggle with our pride don’t we? How easily it can get a choke hold on us and keep us from humbling ourselves in repentance and forgiveness.”

I so desperately want to be a kind, tender-hearted, joy-filled, and holy father to Cali, Carson, Katie, and little pea-in-a-pod.  But unfortunately, I just don’t have it in me.  I can’t do it . . . alone.  By the grace of God at work through the Holy Spirit’s application of the gospel to my life, I can shepherd the hearts of my children in such a way that does not unnecessarily provoke them to anger.

Please pray for me and for all our dads in this church, that “all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander” would be put away from us, “along with all malice.”  That we would be kind to our children, “tender-hearted, forgiving” them, “just as God in Christ also has forgiven” us (Eph. 4:31-32).  May our homes be happy ones because Christ is there and His love is experienced and displayed in extraordinary measure through the ordinary happenings of everyday life!

Justin Culbertson
Berachah Bible Church

A Visit with Job

Some of us are in the middle of our annual reading of the book of Job.  What a catastrophe this man endured.  Losing material goods is one thing but the sudden death of all ten of his children at the same time, what unimaginable grief.  What does Job do?  He worships God.  “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”  Could I have said that?  I hope I would.

Suffering.  We don’t enjoy it but life is full of it.  Job lamented that our days are few “and full of trouble.”  We listen as Job fends off his miserable comforters and deals with his own grief at the same time.  He says that God was “assailing” him (16:9, his face “is red with weeping” (16:16), his “spirit is broken” (17:1).  It seems that he had resigned himself to hopeless, shortened days filled with emotional struggle and an I-am-no-match-for-God attitude.  However, this is only part of the picture.  When we step back and look at Job’s full story the following assessment can be made about pain and suffering in the life of God’s child.

Satan’s aim is to destroy our confidence in God.  The devil himself may not show up at our doorstep.  He has those who run errands for him.  Two basic weapons are used in Satan’s attempts to take us down: pain and pleasure.  Job enjoyed the good life until his world collapsed.  God-given prosperity did not drive a wedge between Job and his fellowship with God.  Then there was pain. But pain was bitter and threatening.  So it is with us.  What does it take to keep you from being enthralled with God and trusting Him every step of the way through life?

God aims to magnify His worth in the lives of His people.  He wants us to value Him above all else.  Job worshiped God after he had lost everything.  Are you going through some terribly difficult times?  What effect is this having upon you? God is infinitely worth our confidence and praise.  “Lord, I do not understand why I am visited with so much pain but I love you and do not doubt that you know what is best for me.”

Satan’s work is ultimately God’s work.  The eye of faith sees behind Satan and reaches up to an infinitely wise, loving, and sovereign God. The devil and his minions may assault us but this is not the whole story.  Satan is always on a divine leash.  He can go no further nor do any work that is beyond the purposes of God.

Sufferers do not need shallow answers and a condemning spirit.  The counsel of Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar is believed by many in our day.  It is found, among other places, in the popular prosperity theology (e.g., “God does not want His children to be sick.”).  Job’s “miserable comforters” set out to defend the honor of God.  They thought Job was maligning the character of God.  They were wrong.  Do not be surprised when in your own time of affliction well intentioned people come to you with bad counsel in the name of helping you.  It has been said that “True theological statements can be false.  There are times when right answers can be wrong answers.”

We can be perplexed about our suffering and ask God questions without sinning.  Job thought that he had suffered undeservedly. He tried to defend himself in the wrong way.  Pride, unbelief, and self-righteousness surfaced.  Dear fellow sufferer, don’t smother your desire to talk candidly to God with grim stoicism.  God delights in the trusting pleadings of His children.

God’s love endures forever, no matter how great our suffering.  Job finally rested in God as his refuge.  There is something, though, that Job didn’t know that we know.  God’s love has been visited upon us on a splintered, wooden cross.  The value of that love has been told through an empty tomb.  What do we learn from the saga of Job’s suffering?  Our suffering can have meaning.  Job’s story anticipates another story.  Suffering can have meaning because the greatest story, the cross of Christ, has been written in the blood of God (Acts 20:28).

Dr. Howard E. Dial
Berachah Bible Church

Darkness

What is the darkest place you have ever experienced?  Our family once visited Mammoth Cave in central Kentucky.  The Park Ranger led us with artificial lighting into this enormous hole in the ground, part of the world’s longest known cave.  There were wonders to behold.  But then all the lights were turned off.  The dark was so dark you could almost feel it.  Thankfully, the lights came back on and we continued our tourist walk.

“Darkness was over the surface of the deep….Then God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light” (Gen. 1:3).  Darkness was created by God.  It became the basis for the establishment of the “Day” and “Night” cycle which has characterized our planet ever since.  Darkness, as the absence of light, is often used in the Bible to describe the condition of fallen, sinful human beings.  Apart from the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit no one is able to experience fellowship with God who is light (Jn. 1:5; 8:12).  The unsaved, those without God’s forgiveness in Christ, are characterized as being in the dark (“for you were formerly darkness, but now you are light in the Lord.” Eph. 5:8).  At conversion those who are blinded by sin and ignorant of God are delivered from the domain of darkness, and transferred “to the kingdom of His beloved Son” (Col. 1:13).  What a wonderful escape from a realm over which Satan and his demons hold sway, a realm in which the grace and mercy are not known (Eph. 6:12; Acts 26:8).

Have you thanked God lately for not having to live in the darkness any longer?  Think of what the absence of light means.  We can’t see things as they actually are.  We were convinced that we really didn’t need God.  Our reasoning process was disabled when it came to understanding spiritual realities.  We had no pleasure in the knowledge of God (Rom. 1:28).  We could not do any good that was acceptable to God.  The sad fact is that a sin- darkened mind uses religion as a defense against God (2 Cor. 4:4).  Living in spiritual darkness has its pleasures. Why else would condemned sinners love it so much?  Jesus knew why His offer of eternal life was rejected so vehemently.  He said, “And this is the judgment, that the light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed” (Jn. 3:19-20).

A new day dawns when a lost sinner is born again.  The light of God’s revealed truth, the Word of God, gradually eliminates the darkness that once ruled our lives. The reality of love that is found in Jesus Christ sweeps away the darkness of this present world.  As Christians we send a message to the world with our Christ-centered love.  Growth and change in our lives signals the coming of a new age.  Christ’s kingdom is coming and we are privileged to be forecasters of that day (1 Jn. 2:8).  How vital it is that we love another.  Christian friend, let’s be about the work of rolling back the tide of darkness in this world by faithfully living out the light of Christ’s presence in our lives.

A former President of the United States was ridiculed by the media for speaking of the importance of citizens being “a thousand points of light” working for the good of the nation.  Political changes have swept that phrase into the dustbin of history.  However, a greater truth remains.  Sons of light are to be points of light, as gospel messengers, so that all those who are enslaved in spiritual darkness will repent and flee from God’s wrath to come.  Eternal outer darkness is waiting for all who refuse to put their trust in Jesus Christ, the Light of the world (Jn. 8:12).

Dr. Howard E. Dial
Berachah Bible Church

A Shared Grief

Our church family is grieving.  Grief is not new to most of us.  But grieving in such a broad and deep way as we are over the death of Lucas Gangi is painfully shared grief.  Of course there are different degrees and kinds of grief involved.  Lucas’s family grief is immeasurable.  Those of us who have lost loved ones in sudden violent ways can empathize with this kind of emotional trauma.  It is a mental, emotional, and physical storm that disorients and devastates.  We weep.  We cry out to God.  We become awash in memories of our loved one or friend.  It’s hard to think clearly.  What does the future hold?

What is grief?  It has been defined as that “inward desolation that follows the losing of something or someone we loved.”  Notice the word “loved.”  The greater our love for someone, the greater the grief.  In his book, A Grief Sanctified, J.I. Packer offers a closer examination of the pain of grief, “We lavish care and affection on what we love and those whom we love, and when we lose the beloved, the shock, the hurt, the sense of being hollowed out and crushed, the haunting, taunting memory of better days, the feeling of unreality and weakness and hopelessness, and the lack of power to think and plan for the new situation can be devastating.”  Packer goes on to discuss how “bereavement becomes a supreme test of the quality of our faith.”   It is by drawing near to God, trusting Him explicitly, that we are able to navigate our way through the storm of grief.  We are tested when he or she is no longer there.  They will not be there the next day or next year.  “Dear Father, how am I to think?  What am I to do?  I need you, Lord.”

Packer’s book offers welcomed guidance in living through grief.  It is subtitled, “Passing through grief to peace and joy.”  Packer has spent a great deal of time examining the thoughts and writings of the English Puritans.  The Puritans were Calvinistic believers in seventeenth century England and North America.  The Bible was their compass through life.  They took God very seriously and immersed their minds in Scripture.  It is one of these Puritans, Richard Baxter, whose memoirs of his wife’s life and death that Packer offers for a study in Christian grief.  It is from this work that the following extended quote is taken.  It is worth our attention.

“Grief, the experiential, emotional fruit of the bereavement event, is, as we have seen, a state of desolation and isolation, of alternating apathy and agony, of inner emptiness and exhaustion.  How may this condition be sanctified- that is, managed, lived with, and lived through, in a way that honors God?  No Puritan to my knowledge addresses the question in this form, but the Puritan answer would be this:

Starting from where you are, do what you can (it may not be much at first) to move toward the thanksgiving, submission, and patience of which we have just heard (the book will have to be read in order to appreciate this thought more fully).

Do not let your grief loosen your grip on the goodness and grace of our loving Lord.

Cry (for there is nothing biblical or Christian, or indeed human, about the stiff upper lip).

Tell God your sadness (several of the psalms, though not written about bereavement, will supply words for the purpose).

Pray as you can, and don’t try to pray as you can’t.  (That bit of wisdom is not original to me, nor was it distilled in a grief counseling context, but it is very apropos here.)

Avoid well-wishers who think they can cheer you up, but thank God for any who are content to be with you and do things for you without talking at you.

Talk to yourself (or, like Richard, write) about the loved one you lost.

Do not try to hurry your way out of the inner weakness you feel; grieving takes time.

Look to God as thankfully, submissively, and patiently as you can (and he will understand if you have to tell him that you cannot really do this yet).

Feel, acknowledge, and face, consciously and from your heart, all the feelings that you find in yourself at present, and the day will come when you find yourself able, consciously and from your heart to live to God daily in thanksgiving, submission, and patient hope once again, as did Richard (Baxter), and Lewis (C.S.), and millions more.

Grieving properly leads back to thinking properly, living properly, and praising properly.  God sees to that!  ‘Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted’ (Matt. 5:4).”

This wise counsel from the past and present is tender and true to the Word of God.  It is included here for our church family and all who are trying to make their way through a life where one that we loved so dearly is missing.  However, this is not the end of our story, if we belong to Christ.  We have that joyful reunion awaiting all who are in Christ when the trumpet sounds and death is abolished.  It will be then that “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there shall no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away” (Rev. 21:4).