By Aimee Byrd

God has ordained very ordinary means to communicate extraordinary grace while the world uses extraordinary means to communicate ordinary, humdrum data.

A study done by Retrevo interviewing one thousand people indicates that 48 percent of us check Facebook before getting out of bed. So eager to get the latest update, many don’t seem to mind being interrupted during a meal, in the bathroom, or even during an intimate moment. Facebook and Twitter seem to be a preferred means to take in the daily news, according to this study. And what is the worthy information that we are running to our gadgets for? One quick glance of my Facebook newsfeed is showing me a picture of a friend’s coffee drink, some people complaining about the weather, a handful of worthy articles to share (and funny ones too), an announcement that a friend’s son received his driving license, as well as numerous selfies and advertisements. Pretty ordinary.

And yet the actual percentage of people who will get out of bed for a worship service as regular attendees may be less than 20 percent. Do the means of grace that God has instituted seem too ordinary to get out of bed for? Are we welcoming interruptions by our social networks while turning a blind eye to the weekly interruption of the age to come into this age—an age that is wasting away? That is in a sense what is happening when we gather for corporate worship—the future is interrupting the present.

While our spectacular, shiny devices mediate our friends’ latest status updates to us, Jesus Christ and all his benefits are conferred to us through the preached Word and the sacraments. Hebrews tells us that Jesus is the Mediator of a better covenant that is established by better promises (8:6). We have direct access to God through Christ’s priestly service. Not only that, but in him we make up the living temple of God, “mediating God’s presence to the world.” The church is a living picture of extraordinary grace. We are a body full of helpless sinners, who have been rescued and redeemed and now embody the Spirit of our Savior himself! Yes, we are individually given the Holy Spirit as a sign and a seal of our new creation in Christ, but together as his church we are his beloved bride that he will come for on that approaching day.

As our weeks bombard us with updates through the means of our extraordinary devices, we may begin to think that we are receiving extraordinary information. But when we are called together as a people to a set-apart space, we hear truly amazing news. We need to hear the gospel preached because this good news is completely outside of ourselves. And not only is the message powerful, but the Word itself is living and active, revealing our hearts (see Heb. 4:12). I may be able to present my best to you on all my social profiles, but before God I am completely exposed. The law of his Word undresses my faux self-importance and self-righteousness, and then the gospel graciously clothes me in the righteousness of Christ. I find that all the little stories I think are significant throughout the week are put in perspective as I’m recast into the divine drama revealed in Scripture.

Michael Horton articulates it so well:

“Created by speech, upheld by speech, and one day glorified by speech, we are, like the rest of creation, summoned beings, not autonomous. We exist because we have been spoken into existence, and we persist in time because the Spirit ensures that the Father’s speaking, in the Son, will not return void.”

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This article is adapted from Theological Fitness by Aimee Byrd

By John M. Frame

If all Scripture testifies of Christ (Luke 24:27; John 5:39), then the law of God surely cannot be an exception. As we study the law, then, we should examine its witness to Christ. I assume that some readers of this book are preparing for Christian ministry. They especially need to know how to use the Decalogue in their preaching and teaching. But all of us need to learn how to see Christ in the law.

The law bears witness to Christ in a number of ways, some of which I shall discuss in the following points.

1. The 10 Commandments presents the righteousness of Christ. Jesus perfectly obeyed God’s law. That is why he was the perfect lamb of God, why God imputes his active righteousness to us, and why he is the perfect example for the Christian life. He never put any god before his Father. He never worshiped idols or took God’s name in vain. Despite what the Pharisees said, he never violated the Sabbath command. So the Decalogue tells us what Jesus was like. It shows us his perfect character.

2. The 10 Commandments shows our need of Christ. God’s law convicts us of sin and drives us to Jesus. It shows us who we are, apart from Christ. We are idolaters, blasphemers, Sabbath breakers, and so on.

3. The 10 Commandments shows the righteousness of Christ imputed to us. In him we are holy. God sees us in Christ, as law keepers.

4. The 10 Commandments shows us how God wants us to give thanks for Christ. In the Decalogue, as we shall see below, obedience follows redemption. God tells his people that he has brought them out of Egypt. The law is not something they must keep to merit redemption. God hasredeemed them. Keeping the law is the way they thank God for salvation freely given. So the Heidelberg Confession expounds the law under the category of gratefulness.

5. Christ is the substance of the law. This point is related to the first, but it is not quite the same. Here I wish to say that Jesus is not only a perfect law keeper, according to his humanity, but also the one we honor and worship, according to his deity, when we keep the law.

(a) The first commandment teaches us to worship Jesus as the one and only Lord, Savior, and mediator (Acts 4:12; 1 Tim. 2:5).

(b) In the second commandment, Jesus is the one perfect image of God (Col. 1:15; Heb. 1:3). Our devotion to him precludes worship of any other image.

(c) In the third commandment, Jesus is the name of God, that name to which every knee shall bow (Phil. 2:10–11; cf. Isa. 45:23).

(d) In the fourth commandment, Jesus is our Sabbath rest. In his presence, we cease our daily duties and hear his voice (Luke 10:38–42). He is Lord of the Sabbath as well (Matt. 12:8), who makes the Sabbath his own Lord’s Day (Rev. 1:10).

(e) In the fifth commandment, we honor Jesus, who restores us to the divine family as he submits himself entirely to the will of the Father (John 5:19–24).

(f) In the sixth commandment, we honor him as our life (John 10:10; 14:6; Gal. 2:20; Col. 3:4), the Lord of life (Acts 3:15), the one who gave his life that we might live (Mark 10:45).

(g) In the seventh commandment, we honor him as our bridegroom, who gave himself to cleanse us, to make us his pure, spotless bride (Eph. 5:22–33). We love him as no other.

(h) In the eighth commandment, we honor Jesus as the source of our inheritance (Eph. 1:11), as the one who provides everything that his people need in this world and beyond.

(i) In the ninth commandment, we honor him as God’s truth (John 1:17; 14:6), in whom all the promises of God are Yes and Amen (2 Cor. 1:20).

(j) In the tenth commandment, we honor him as our complete sufficiency (2 Cor. 3:5; 12:9) to meet both our external needs and the renewed desires of our hearts. In him we can be content with what we have, thankful for his present and future gifts.

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This article is adapted from Doctrines of the Christian Life by John M. Frame

By Aimee Byrd

If we are growing in our faith, does this mean we sin less? The answer is both yes and no.

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If we really are growing in the faith, shouldn’t we be sinning less? What does it mean to be a mature Christian? After all, since we are being sanctified and transformed into Christ’s likeness, I would expect that at thirty-seven I would not be struggling with sin like I was at seventeen. Well, I have a yes and a no to this answer.

Yes.

Looking back to my seventeen-year-old self certainly makes me feel holier. Many of the sins that I committed on a regular basis back then are not even desirable to me anymore. For that I am very thankful. And in the twenty years that have passed, God has given me better desires. Compared to Aimee at seventeen, they are much deeper. I see the fruit of righteousness being cultivated in my life. And yet my barometer of holiness is not to be compared to a younger version of myself; it is to be compared to the holy God.

No.

Here I am at thirty-seven, torn up over my sin on a regular basis. If God has been faithful in my sanctification, why am I still struggling so much with my sin? As you probably know from experience yourself, in his grace God progressively reveals our sin to us as we grow in holiness. It’s not so much that we’re developing new sins as Christians; rather it’s that our sins have been developing, and now God is going to reveal them to us as he prepares us to face them. As we grow in our love for the Lord, we also hate our sin more. As we meditate on the cross, we are exposed.

With growth comes a mature awareness of our sin. I would like to think that I am sinning less as a thirty-seven-year-old, but a growing understanding of the severe depth of my sinfulness also assures me of the processes of sanctification. At seventeen, I was well aware of a list of sins that I was committing. I even knew that some of them were pretty bad. But I had the immature idea that as I grew, I would knock off those sins one by one and then be a mature Christian. I was completely deceived about the gravity of my sinfulness. Repentance has become much more dear to me as I have grown in holiness.

Because of Jesus’ death and resurrection, we can know that we are no longer dead in our sins but alive in Christ (Eph. 2:1, 5). Because we are forgiven and have the work of his Spirit applying Christ’s accomplishment on our behalf, we can push forward toward holiness. Our unity in Christ gives us a growing longing and desire to know him and be like him. And because of our union with Christ, we truly are being sanctified. Only God knows the number of our sins, but every one of them was paid for by Christ’s blood.

Yes, we are saved by grace, but that grace is expensive. Therefore we abhor sin, hold fast to God’s promises in Christ, and, by his Spirit, we are now able to mortify sin and truly grow toward our assured goal of glorification with him. “And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:6)..

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This article is adapted from Theological Fitness: Why We Need a Fighting Faith by Aimee Byrd

In a time when governments and kingdoms seem to fail us. It’s important to remind our kids that God still rules the world. But how do we teach them? Sally Michael gives us some advice.

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When you were little, did you ever sit on someone’s lap and steer the car down the driveway? When you got out of the car, did you think, “I drove the car!”? Did you really drive the car? Who really drove the car? In some ways, we are all like little children, thinking we are driving the car. We think we are in charge, controlling things, when really God is the driver—He is controlling all things. Powerful people especially, like kings and presidents, might think they can control things. But God is really still in charge. A king might be on the throne of his country, but God is on the throne of heaven! He is the King of Kings. “For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods” (Psalm 95:3).

God is the one writing the story of the world, not kings, rulers, or presidents. Do you know who decides who will be the next president? In the end, it is not the people who vote for him, but the God who rules over all things. God, not kings and rulers, is who makes countries great or weak.

The people of Israel had a king—the very best king. God was their Ruler. But they decided they wanted a man for a king, like all the other people had. Was that a good idea—to trust a man instead the all-knowing, all-powerful, good God? Did they understand that God is the best ruler of all?

It was a bad thing that Israel really didn’t want God’s rule. So God gave them a man as a king to teach them a lesson. This was already part of God’s plan for Israel. Even before Saul was born, God had chosen Saul as the king of Israel. So God sent the prophet Samuel to crown1 Saul as king.

But Saul wasn’t king for very long before he forgot that God is the greatest Ruler and all His laws are good and right. Instead of bowing to the King of Kings and obeying God as the greatest and wisest Ruler, Saul disobeyed God and did not follow God’s instructions. Saul thought he could disobey the King of Kings just because he was the king of Israel.

Is it okay for anyone to disobey God? No, not even a king has the right to disobey God. A king is not greater than God. A king cannot change God’s commands. A king does not know all things. Only God has the right, power, wisdom, and goodness to rule the world well. So every king and leader needs God.

But Saul did not trust God or thank God for His help. He did not have a heart that followed God. When Saul led the army of Israel to fight against the Amalekites and won, Saul set up a statue to show his own greatness. Saul did not proclaim the greatness and worth of God. He did not give God the glory for being strong and winning over the enemy.

In the end, because Saul did not have the heart to follow God and did not want God’s rule over him, God would not let him be king any longer. God was showing Israel who really is in charge and who is the Most High.

Blessed be the name of God forever and ever, to whom belong wisdom and might. He changes times and seasons; he removes kings and sets up kings; he gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have understanding. (Daniel 2:20–21)

There was another king who did not recognize God as the King of Kings. He didn’t rule over Israel like Saul; he ruled over Babylon, and his name was Nebuchadnezzar. God made Babylon a great country and helped Nebuchadnezzar to build beautiful buildings. But instead of thanking and worshiping God for being the Most High, the King of all things, this is what Nebuchadnezzar said: “Is not this great Babylon, which I have built by my mighty power as a royal residence and for the glory of my majesty?” (Daniel 4:30).

What was wrong in Nebuchadnezzar’s heart? Why does this dishonor God? No one can take away the praise that belongs to God. God is the great King over all kings. He is the one who makes kings to be kings. He is the one who makes countries strong or weak. He is the one who gives all good things. But Nebuchadnezzar did not recognize all that God did for him. Nebuchadnezzar boasted about his own greatness instead of the greatness and worth of God.

What do you think God did about that? “While the words were still in the king’s mouth, there fell a voice from heaven, ‘O King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is spoken: The kingdom has departed from you’ ” (Daniel 4:31). God took away all the power, money, and respect Nebuchadnezzar had. He was no longer a great king. Now he had nothing to be proud about. He was not in charge. Even kings are ruled by God. Kings and presidents rule for only a little while. But God rules forever.

His dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom endures from generation to generation; all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, “What have you done?” (Daniel 4:34–35)

It is good for us all to remember that kings and presidents are just men who God rules over. He makes them rulers, and He takes their rule away. Rulers can do only what God lets them do. They can rule only as long as God lets them. They cannot do whatever they want—no one can do that but God. Every ruler, just like every person, needs God.

Sing praises to God, sing praises! Sing praises to our King, sing praises! For God is the King of all the earth; sing praises with a psalm! God reigns over the nations; God sits on his holy throne. (Psalm 47:6–8)

Suggested Activity: With your family, make a list of three to five people who rule your city, state, or country. Find one or two verses you can pray for them. Make a prayer list with these names and verses. Pray together as a family.

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This article is adapted from God’s Providence by Sally Michael