Thursday, February 12, 2009

Joyful Martyrs: Part II

Last week I wrote how we are to embrace difficultes with joy that we might follow in the footsteps of our Lord. While the truth of this applies to all, there are particular groups prone to thinking things really should be easier. Here is some advice to those groups.

1. Parents need to carefully examine their attitude toward their children. It is very easy to approach young ones (or teenagers!) as a necessary duty, but not a joy. Children and all the difficulties associated with them can quickly become a burden. Instead of recognizing that raising children is the essence of building the Kingdom of Christ, we see our duties at home as obstacles to "the real work." We will bear little fruit if we see children as a burden and do not raise them in joy.

2. Pastors are frequently guilty of this approach to their flocks. They imagine that Paul never had things as bad as they do. The apathy, the immorality, the pettiness can create a perspective on God's people that is unbibical. A pastor can find himself looking on the flock as a great drain on his time and energy. He sees what God has given to other men and assumes that he deserves those things and that the path God has given these other men is easier than his. Both of these are carcinogens to the soul. The minute a man believes things are better somewhere else is the minute he begins to lose his passion for those in front of him. He is not called to be a Piper or MacArthur. He is called to embrace with joy the flock in front of him.

3. Finally, with the church in America in such disarray, we should expect God to raise up reformers whom God will use to call His people back. Young reformers in particular tend to think this type of thing is easy, a quick fix. The persecution, hatred, back-biting, and general animosity that often accompanies attempts at reform are forgotten. A good dose of church history will cure that. Reformers always pay a dear price for their attempts. From Jeremiah to Paul to Wycliffe to Bonhoefer the cost is heavy. All is rosy at the beginning, but the long, hot road of reform can discourage many a man. We are fools if we believe the recovery of the Gospel in our age will leave us or our loved ones unscarred.

In 1544 John Calvin published a book calling the German princes to support the Reformation in Europe. Calvin anticipates that many princes will not take up the mantle of the Reformation believing the work to be too difficult. Here is what he says, "However, considering, according to the well-known sentiment of an old proverb, that there is nothing illustrious which is not also difficult and arduous, can we wonder, that in the greatest and most excellent of all causes we must fight our way through many difficulties." How quickly we forget that all good things come at a great cost. Die with joy knowing that the Lord loves to raise the dead.

2 comments:

Jeff Moss said...

Thank you, Peter! It's a good and timely exhortation not only to obey God, but to rejoice even in the difficulties.

Tricia said...

Thanks for letting me know about this post (through facebook). I really enjoyed reading this; it was full of good points. :) I guess trials and difficulties can go hand in hand with intense joy.

Let the saints be joyful in glory, let them sing aloud on their beds, let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a two edged sword in their hand, to execute vengeance on the nations, and punishments on the peoples; to bind the kings with chains and their nobles with fetters of iron. Psalm 149:5-8