Our Great God!

Mike Leake 1 Comment

I am always a little reluctant to share stories like this. It could have a great effect or it could have adverse ones. The truth is, I would be saying “our great God!” whether this blessing happened or not (or at least I’d hope I would). But as it stands the Lord has shown us His mercy, grace, and power this morning.

As many of you know Nikki and I are having our first child in January. The Lord has blessed us with not only the baby but we have also been able to save up a little, so as to provide for him. As we have had a few expenditure’s, our savings and checking both have been dwindling. We found out a couple of weeks ago that a scholarship was not coming through and by today we would have to pay the college $710–wiping out our savings. To add to this, Nikki was almost a felon (she was speeding late for work one morning) her fine is due Monday. I say all of this to say that this morning I was walking over to our secretary to see if I could get an advance on my paycheck because we were a short a few dollars. We were still trusting that God was going to provide, although beginning to get a little scared.

As I began walking to the office our pastor greeted me half way (out in the blistering cold) and gave me a card. I opened it and to my surprise inside the card were 5 Benny Frank’s–that’s nerd for $500. Wow! Needless to say I did not need to go ask for an advance. This blessing is wonderful and amazing and a great reminder that our Father is very gracious and merciful. Another reminder that he covers over our sin (Nikki’s ticket) and lavishes upon us much much more than we deserve. What is even more astonishing is that this is but a glimpse of a glimpse of what awaits us in glory. When the Lord gives us the greatest treasure–Full enjoyment of Himself! I await that day…but until then I’m enjoying His previews before seeing the full feature.

The Message of Malachi

Mike Leake

Last night we finished our next to last book on the Minor Prophets–Malachi. We will be doing two messages on Zechariah and then sum it all up with a Christmas message on the Promised King. Then we will kick the New Year off by starting a series on “Being Godly Men and Women”. But until then lets take a look back at Malachi.

We listed six different marks of indifference and then gave suggestions on how to battle them.

  1. When you are questioning God’s love for you focus on His electing love in redemption.
  2. When you are engaging in half-hearted worship focus on God’s awesome character.
  3. When you are struggling with infidelity guard yourselves and do not be faithless
  4. When you are questioning God’s justice focus on His past fulfillments and future promises
  5. When you are selfishly giving half-hearted devotion focus on the storehouse of God’s pleasures.
  6. When you lose hope and feel like giving up look to your future redemption or judgment

For all of the details you can find the sermon here: Battling Indifference While We Wait

Wow!

Mike Leake

I am indebted to a dear pastor friend for pointing me to this sermon. I finally today had the time to listen to it (undistracted) for its longevity. I would urge you to do the same. It was preached at the Desiring God 2003 National Conference. The Conference was in honor of Jonathan Edwards and the sermon to which I am referring is by Sam Storms. Dr. Storms has written an excellent book called Pleasures Evermore among others. You can read lots of material for free at http://www.enjoyinggodministries.com

Here is the sermon to which I was referring: Joy’s Eternal Increase

P.S. I am trying to put a music playlist on the sidebar–If I get that figured out I will post audio sermons on the sidebar as well

Burroughs–Freely Submitting to God

Mike Leake
The fifth characteristic (which is the second half of Burroughs original definition) is that Christian contentment is “freely submitting to and taking pleasure in God’s disposal”. Today (p.8) we will see that there are three things (Burroughs says there are four, but only lists three) to be explained about this “freedom of spirit”.
  1. The heart is readily brought over. Burroughs simply means that if you really are content and “freely submitting” then it will not take a cattle prod to get you into contentment. Burroughs says that if we really are content then, “as soon as you come to see that it is the hand of God your heart acts readily and closes and once”.
  2. It is freely, that is, not by constraint. It is not that we “must” be content. We do it with joy. It is also not because of ignorance that we freely submit. If our contentment stems from not knowing any better then it cannot truly be called “free”. True freedom comes whenever we “know the condition [we] are in as an afflicted and sad condition, and still [have] a sanctified judgment [to bring our hearts to contentment].”
  3. It is in opposition to mere stupidity. This appears to be much the same point as number 2. Burroughs likens this to pinching a man with paralysis and then praising him for his patience and tolerance of bearing such a terrible affliction. He could not feel it, how can you praise him? True contentment is likened to when you can feel the pinch and do not pop the guy in the teeth (my words not Burroughs).
Burroughs then continues with his sixth point and because it is short we will too. He hopes to expound upon what it means to “submit to God’s disposal”. “The word submit,” says Burroughs, “signifies nothing else but ‘to send under'”. What he means by that is that submitting means to bow yourself before the feet of God. It is when our soul, “can send itself under [bow before] the power and authority and sovereignty and dominion that God has over it.” That causes me to ask myself today, am I freely submitting to God’s rule? Do I live in proper authority, bowing before God’s dominion over me? Does my heart readily submit to His and say, “Have thine own way Lord, Have thine own way”?
Next time we will look take this another step and look at having pleasure in God’s disposal.