Sibbes and Affections for Inferior Things (YWS Week 18)

Nick Horton 2 Comments

richardsibbessmallWelcome to a year of reading Richard Sibbes together! The reading plan for the entire year can be accessed here. I encourage you to stick with us, allow yourself time to read, and soak in the riches of this gifted and prolific Puritan preacher. You will be edified and encouraged.

If you have trouble with how Sibbes used words, check out the Lexicons of Early Modern English for definitions from the period.

Summary/Engagement

“It’s God’s will for you to live in prosperity instead of poverty.”
“God wants us to prosper financially, to have plenty of money, to fulfill the destiny He has laid out for us.”
~ Joel Osteen.

What do you think Osteen’s affections are fixed on? The problem with the prosperity gospel is that God is not the ends, he’s the means. God is the ATM machine that you punch the right code in to get cash. Never mind the gift of his son and the mercy offered us in his life, death, and resurrection. Why bother with the offer of eternal life with God, reconciliation with him, and the blessing of his presence. No, let’s just trample all over that on our way to the buffet table where we can gorge and then demand more from our slot machine deity.

Any gospel that does not have at its center the finished work of Jesus Christ for the glory of God is a false gospel. Osteen preaches a false gospel of material wealth, health, and comfort. This is not the gospel of Jesus Christ. Compare his desire for favor and wealth and comfort with Sibbes’ warnings not to be enthralled with anything but Christ.

“He that is little in his own eyes will not be troubled to be little in the eyes of others.”

“Frame peace by freeing our hearts from too much fear, and riches by freeing our hearts from covetous desires. Frame a sufficiency out of contentedness.”

Application / Further Discussion

The central issue of the prosperity gospel is a heart of misplaced affections. It desires the things of the world; comfort, health, money, prestige. The desires are for worldly things and not God himself. If the desire of your heart is not chiefly for Jesus Christ, you are not saved. If God is merely the means by which you get paid, you are not saved. If Jesus is a label you wear and a magic formula you invoke to get what you want, you are not saved.

The things of this world are not necessarily evil. Many things are morally neutral. It is fine to be prosperous, to be healthy, to have a level of comfort. However, when those things supersede God himself they become idols. What are your affections focused on? The things of this world are tools to use or distractions to avoid. They make horrible gods that lead you to hell.

“If the soul itself be out of tune, outward things will do no more good than a fair shoe to a gouty foot.”

Is your soul tuned to God? If not, all of these things are about as useful as a 500 dollar shoe on a foot with gout that hurts so bad you can’t wear it. Useless. This life is not about acquisition, comfort, and greed. God knows that wealth can be a poison to our heart. Jesus told the rich young ruler to sell all that he had, give it away, and follow him. (Matt. 19:16-22) He said it was easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven (Matt 19:23) Not because money is evil, but because our hearts are evil.

“The life of a Christian should be a meditation how to unloose his affections from inferior things.”

Our desires for God are weak. Our hearts pull us in every direction for things we think are important, but compared to God they are inferior. Pray for God to change your heart to love him more. Pray for your desire for God to be increased, and your worldly desires to be decreased. Meditate on how to cut your affections loose for inferior things. Anything that is not God is inferior.

Don’t settle for being easily pleased. God is far too magnificent and wondrous to be reduced to the rule of your butler or cash machine. Take your broken heart to him and pray that he changes it.

I leave you with Sovereign Grace’s “All I Have Is Christ.” Is Christ all you have?

 


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Last week, we finished chapters 1-6 of The Soul’s Conflict.

Next week, we’ll read chapters 14-20 of The Soul’s Conflict.

I’m Shocked

Mike Leake 1 Comment

It’s Wednesday night and for the fourth time this week and Sally finds herself praying all too familiar of words: “Lord, forgive me for my bitterness and the way that I lashed out at my friend.” She’s frustrated that she continues to come back to this same spot. But what more can she expect? She shouldn’t be surprised that she keeps coming back to this spot—should she?

Another evening squandered on laziness. What started as a quick game on his PS4 turned into him staying up until 3:00 AM. Jim will be tired for work tomorrow. He’ll be grouchy. He’ll be wide open for depression. Not to mention the guilt that will follow him because he once again chose an evening of shooting imaginary soldiers over spending time with his real family. But what more can he expect? He shouldn’t be surprised that he—a finite sinful human being—chose a game over a relationship with his family.

I could give a ton of other examples. Some made up and a litany of examples from my own life. We sin. Daily. And even when we think that we have grown in one area we find that the remnant of sin runs much deeper than we thought. In all of this we aren’t shocked. Sin no longer shocks us.

I wonder if that’s a good thing? Is it okay that we are so at home with our depravity—knowing what the gospel says about fallen man oh so well—that we are no longer shocked by our sin.

As I think through this I’m reminded of Paul’s response to the Galatians:

I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel…” Galatians 1:6

Paul is absolutely astonished that they could so quickly fall away. Is there a place for this type of language in the church today? Do we allow ourselves to be shocked by our sinful turning away from Christ? Or are we so at home with our depravity that we just say, “Ah, this is what is to be expected, now run back to Jesus”.

Even the Corinthians seem to shock Paul. In 1 Corinthians 5 he is astonished that they are boasting about their loose attitude towards sin when they should have been mourning. Likewise he can’t believe that they are so ignorant in their eschatology that they would talk each other to court. Shock. Shock. Shock. It’s all over the pages of Corinthians.

I could be way off here but I have to believe that something is way off in our view of sanctification if sin no longer shocks us. After all we’ve been washed, we’ve been sanctified, we’ve been justified (1 Corinthians 6:11) and our old self has been crucified (Romans 6). When we think about everything that Christ has done on our behalf, when we consider the powerful presence of the indwelling Spirit, when we consider who we really are in Christ Jesus, then I believe we ought to be just as astonished as Paul at our failings.

And as our hearts turn to shock that we could once again fall, and once again come back to this same spot of repentance, let our hearts be even more shocked that Christ is bigger and that once again we find ourselves covered—absolutely—by His blood.

Be shocked.

Today in Blogworld 05.08.14

Mike Leake 2 Comments

5 Observations about Younger Southern Baptists

As a younger Southern Baptist myself, I agree with Trevin’s observations.

I Miss the Absurdity

I always appreciate Tim’s writing—but I especially love it when he writes articles like this one. This stage of parenting is just around the corner for us.

The Poetic Wonder of Isaac Watts

I’m intrigued by Isaac Watts. So I was very excited to see this Free eBook made available through May. 

5 Signs Your Child Is Not Saved

This is very helpful. Also heart-wrenching. But helpful. My children are young enough that this isn’t gut-wrenching pain—I pray that the Lord saves them soon.

Some Amazon reviews are funny. Rhett and Link reenact the reviews. This is hilarious:

A Thirst for Knowledge, A Thirst for Porn

Mike Leake 3 Comments

A group of guys are sitting at a table arguing about who won the 1984 World Series MVP. If the year was 1994 then the argument would go on until somebody got home and looked up in their copy of Sports Almanac. Today the argument will last only as long as it takes for someone to grab their iPhone and consult the mighty Google machine.

Willie Hernandez.

Argument over.

You want to know something, then you Google it. It’s your God-given right to have this information and it is at your finger tips. We are an information-saturated culture. I’d almost argue that many of us are addicted to information. We can’t let questions go unanswered anymore. Willie Hernandez must be known.

Knowledge is a good thing. There is nothing innately wrong with someone settling an argument by Googling the 1984 World Series MVP. In fact it can be quite helpful.

The problem is when we believe knowledge is a right. And it becomes a big problem when that foolish belief collides with our sex-crazed culture.

Many young men are introduced to pornography out of curiosity. They simply want to know what those forbidden parts look like. And then that curiosity gets more pointed. They want to know what certain celebrities look like naked. It never satisfies.

It’s not only young men that have been caught in this snare. It’s trapped many good and seemingly faithful men. They don’t begin on a quest to view porn for sexual pleasure. It’s a quest to view forbidden images for the sake of knowledge. But those images aren’t just innocent facts like who won the 1984 World Series MVP. They are flaming darts meant to cause you to wind up like a gutted deer hanging from a tree.

Brothers, don’t believe the lie the enemy is whispering in your ear. You aren’t doing research. You aren’t merely on a quest for knowledge. You are on a prideful jaunt into the land of the forbidden. You think that it is your right to see what ought not be seen by your eyes. It is not. This information is not yours to hold. This is sin.

Your thirst for knowledge wasn’t meant to be satisfied. Your thirst for knowledge was meant to be spent on the eternal–ever filling but never complete. You can’t just Google the answer. There is no “argument over” when it comes to beholding the infinitely beautiful God. It is in the Person of Christ that you and I ought to direct our gaze and our desire to know and behold and worship.

Don’t waste such a beautiful gift on inferior joys than come to a climax. Spend this gift—this thirst—on the bottomless joy of God in Christ.