David Mathis works for both Desiring God and Bethlehem Baptist Church as the Executive Pastoral Assistant for John Piper.

Watch John Piper (on C.S. Lewis, on William Tyndale) explain how the biblical gospel destroys morality, external conformity, and list-keeping religion:

Dear friends in the Seattle area and at Westmont College,

Come worship Jesus with us at a special Friday night gathering, February 26, at Mars Hill Church’s Ballard Campus.

God willing, Pastor Piper will also be preaching at Mars Hill on Sunday, February 28, before heading to Santa Barbara to speak in chapel at Westmont College on Monday, March 1.

This week's sermon: "I Will Build My Church"

Why plant new churches in America? You may be surprised by the statistics.

1. There are about 200 million non-churched people in America, making America one of the four largest “unchurched” nations in the world.
2. Each year about 3,500 churches close their doors permanently.
3. Today, of the approximately 350,000 churches in America, four out of five are either plateaued or declining.
4. One American denomination recently found that 80% of its converts came to Christ in churches less than two years old.

Each church has her weaknesses—and strengths. In planting new churches, we pray not for replications of already existing churches with all their weaknesses, but more and more of incarnations of biblical vision and gospel theology without the same limitations and imperfections. What the world needs is not the multiplication of our imperfections and limitations but new sets of imperfections and limitations. Multiplying churches with different strengths and weaknesses means coming closer to meeting the crying needs of the world.

Mark this well: Jesus does not promise that he will build his school, or that he will build his co-op, or build his medical clinic, or build his university, or build his social service agency—as good as those are. He promises with absolute authority: "I will build my church."

The 2010 Desiring God Conference for Pastors begins this evening, which means some spectacular book deals for those of you who will be here in Minneapolis (and this list of recommendations for those of you ordering from home).

For those shopping in person, the DG Bookstore is

• located in Room 101 at the Minneapolis Convention Center (behind FedEx/Kinkos, just outside the auditorium where the main sessions are)
• stocked with 1,275 different titles and nearly 20,000 individual items
• open 3:00pm-10pm today
           7:30am-10pm Tuesday
           7:30am-1pm Wednesday

Snow Storms

This week in Minnesota, the main Storms to keep an eye on (along with snowstorms) is our keynote speaker. For those wanting to get to know Sam’s life and theology, a greatly loved book of his is Convergence: Spiritual Journeys of a Charismatic Calvinist.

And you may want to check out Sam’s new 2-volume devotional on 2 Corinthians called A Sincere and Pure Devotion to Christ which provides 100 daily meditations (50 in each volume). We also have several other good devotional books by Sam.

All Storms titles are at least 25% off during the conference.

Clive Staples Who?

Our conference bookstore is the place to be for C.S. Lewis fans. We have plenty Lewis titles and biographies on hand, including classics like Mere Christianity, The Weight of Glory, and Surprised by Joy. We have a feeling those in attendance will hear a lot of C.S. Lewis quotations this week.

It’s a Tripp

We’re privileged to have Paul David Tripp providing this year’s pre-conference seminar, and the DG Bookstore has several Tripp titles ready. Among those are Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands, War of Words, and his most recent Broken-Down House.

Paul will be available at a “Meet the Author” session from 8:45-10:00 p.m. on Tuesday night in the Bookstore.

Also accessible during the author-meet is Adrian Warnock. Just off the press is his first book Raised with Christ: How the Resurrection Changes Everything (I’m very eager to read it, but it’s so new I haven’t had the chance yet). Adrian is a dear British brother who runs one of the top evangelical blogs in the UK.

New Titles

The Trellis & the Vine: The Ministry Mind-shift That Changes Everything by Col Marshall and Tony Payne is perhaps the most important book I’ve read in a long time. We highly recommend this recent publication from Matthias Media. (Put it together with Chester’s and Timmis’ Total Church and Dever’s and Alexander’s The Deliberate Church for an outstanding trilogy on Christian ministry.)

For the history buff (and Bible-lovers!) look for Ancient Word, Changing Worlds: The Doctrine of Scripture in a Modern Age by Stephen. J. Nichols and Eric T. Brandt.

Thank God for Vern Poythress. His most recent In the Beginning Was the Word: Language—A God-Centered Approach is outstanding, and similar in its remarkableness is Redeeming Science: A God-Centered Approach.

Read whatever Frame and Poythress you can get your hands on. (Speaking the Truth in Love: The Theology of John M. Frame is worth its weight in gold, and at 1,100-plus pages, that’s saying a lot!)

New Piper Titles

Last but not least are the new Piper titles. Out just this month are A Sweet & Bitter Providence: Sex, Race, and the Sovereignty of God and its companion poetry volume Ruth: Under the Wings of God. Still fresh are the fifth Swans book Filling Up the Afflictions of Christ and The Power of Words and the Wonder of God (co-edited with Justin Taylor).

Worship

One older title to recommend (not really old at all) that I picked up recently and continue to get help from: Worship by the Book, edited by D.A. Carson. Carson’s introductory chapter is terrific, as is Tim Keller’s (extended) final chapter. On that note, Keller’s most recent Counterfeit Gods might be his best yet (and his two previous books are very good).

*     *     *     *     *

Previous DG Conference Recommended Lists

• National Conference 2007
• Pastors Conference 2008
• National Conference 2008
• Pastors Conference 2009
• Pastors Conference 2010 Recommended Resources

Each January John Piper prepares a brief annual report for Bethlehem summarizing the highlights from the previous year. His 2009 annual report is now online.

Now all of his annual reports since 1990 are available on the DG website.

I recommend Doug Wilson’s Five Cities that Ruled the World (Thomas Nelson, 2009). The cities he highlights are Jerusalem, Athens, Rome, London, and New York, each leaving the world a legacy.

Jerusalem has bequeathed to us a legacy of the spirit; Athens, reason and the mind; Rome, law; London, literature; and New York, industry and commerce. (xx)

In developing the literary legacy of London, Wilson unearths this nugget from C. S. Lewis about William Tyndale and the Reformation:

Tyndale was willing to endure great trials because of what he believed about the gospel. C. S. Lewis explained that the “whole purpose of the ‘gospel,’ for Tyndale, is to deliver us from morality. Thus, paradoxically, the ‘puritan’ of modern imagination—the cold, gloomy heart, doing as duty what happier and richer souls do without thinking of it—is precisely the enemy which historical Protestantism arose and smote.” (128-129, quoting Lewis from his English Literature in the Sixteenth Century [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1954], 187)

This week's sermon: "Born Blind for the Glory God: Eugenics by Abortion Is an Abomination to God"

Haiti happens every day in the world's abortion clinics, where 130,000 human lives are destroyed. In the United States 3,000 die daily, crushed in the earthquake of abortion (more than the 2,976 who died in the 9/11 attacks).

With the advent of widespread prenatal testing availability, a kind of "eugenics by abortion" is growing, as parents kill their disabled offspring at a horrific rate. As Wesley Smith writes, "Americans may heartily cheer participants in the Special Olympics, but we abort some 90 percent of all gestating infants diagnosed with genetic disabilities such as Down Syndrome, dwarfism, and spina bifida."

The Christian Bible has a message to speak: There is both forgiveness for those guilty of abortion and a whole new way of thinking about disability. God is the one who knits together humanity in the womb, and God has his good and perfect designs in every disability.

Jesus shows us that the man born blind in John 9 was disabled for the glory of God, for his own good, and for the good of countless others. Not only did Jesus physically heal him, but then he pursued him, to perform the ultimate healing: opening his spiritual eyes to see the glory of the Son of God.

In every disability and death, Jesus is at work, for his Father's glory and for the good of those who love him and are called according to his purpose (Romans 8:28).

Jesus keeps us off balance. We think we know that perfection is a fastball of justice, and he throws us the curveball of grace.

When I read Matthew 5:48 abstracted from it’s context, I’m thinking mainly in terms of justice.

You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

“Perfect,” ah yes, surely that’s mainly about being just. But Jesus’ context gives this charge some wicked spin.

Despite what I would guess in extrapolating from verse 48, with my innate definition of perfection, Matthew 5:38-47 is all about moving beyond mere justice to God-like grace. “Perfection” in God is not merely “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” (verse 38) but turning the other cheek, giving more than is asked, walking the extra mile (verses 39-42).

The just thing would be to love those who love you and hate those who hate you (verse 43), but Jesus disorients us with this strange conception of perfection: “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (verse 44).

Who is this guy—and what kind of serious rethinking (call it “new birth”) do we need to get in line with his Father in heaven?

I would think that “perfection” means giving the unrighteous what they deserve: no sunshine, no rain. But Jesus says about his Father, “He makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust” (verse 45).

The kind of perfection that Jesus says comes from his Father—and the kind he calls his disciples to pursue—does not find its sense of completion in delivering retribution for wrongs done. Rather, it is the perfection of a heart that finds so much fulfillment and satisfaction in the God of grace that it is able to extend grace to those who don’t deserve it.

Bethlehem's new website now has the audio from December 26-27, 2009, the weekend John Piper preached at The Village Church in Dallas. Our guest preacher was Bob Glenn of Redeemer Bible Church, a dear sister church in the Twin Cities.

Bob's message is titled "The Outrageous Love of God" from Jonah 4, and his refrain is that we won't see how outrageous God's love is until we've been outraged by it. It's well worth the listen.

Thanks, Bob, for serving our people so well.

This week's sermon: "Help the Children Love the Different People"

God gives parents the privilege of being the primary shapers of their children¹s attitude to racial differences. According to Ephesians 6:1-4, both mom and dad are to be honored and obeyed by their children. This is God's good plan for our great good, and where this breaks down, everything begins to break down.

Fathers are named specifically in Ephesians 6:4 and have an especially prominent role in shaping the minds and hearts of their children in accord with the Lord¹s instruction. And part of that instruction is the Lord's truth about racial differences and how we should think and feel and act about them.

Here are 8 ways (among other possible ways) for moms and dads to help their children to love people who are different from them:

1. Help the children believe in God¹s sovereign wisdom and goodness in creating them with the body that they have.
   
   
2. Help the children believe in God's sovereign wisdom and goodness in making other people with the body that they have.
   
   
3. Help the children believe that they and all other children and adults are made in God's image.
   
   
4. Teach the children that God tells us to do to others as we would like others to do to us.
   
   
5. Teach the children and model for them that their own sin is uglier than anybody they think is physically unattractive.
   
   
6. Teach the children that God loves them in spite of the ugliness of their sin and that he proved this by sending his Son to die for our sins and give forgiveness to all who would trust him.
   
   
7. Teach the children that because Jesus died for them and rose again, he becomes for them an all-satisfying Friend and Treasure.
   
   
8. Teach the children to love others who are different from them, not in order to be accepted by God, but because they already are accepted by God because of Jesus.

It is the power of God in the gospel that is the power to love people different from ourselves. This is the key we give to our children, and the key to daily life as parents.

This week's sermon: "Holding Fast the Word of Life in 2010"

The Bible is not magic. It holds no guarantee that reading it will produce spiritual life and health and growth. But this much is guaranteed: There won't be spiritual life and health and growth without God's word.

The sovereign God gives his grace by his Spirit as he wills, and he does so through his word. Without receiving his word, we starve every grace that God means for us to thrive on his world.

Join us in our longing and prayer to give ourselves to the word of God in 2010.

We’re now a week and a half into 2010, but it’s not too late to start a read-through-the-Bible-in-a-year plan. After all, you have more than 50 weeks to catch up on what you’ve missed. Or treat your year as January 10, 2010, through January 10, 2011.

Below are several good options.

Discipleship Journal
NavPress’s Discipleship Journal plan has been the most used at Bethlehem for years. I’m back at this one again in 2010, and I would highly recommend it. There are four daily readings (the year starts with Genesis, Psalms, Matthew, and Acts), but it’s only 25 days each month—which leaves some margin for missing here and there when life gets busy.

For Shirkers and Slackers
If “margin for missing” is what you know you need, then this plan from Ransom Fellowship might be right for you. Maybe you’ve tried the other plans in the past and stalled out again and again. This plan assigns certain genres to certain days of the week and breaks biblical books up into sections you can read in one sitting—so without reading everyday, you can still make measurable headway. Pace yourself well and do some extra reading, and you might even finish long before 2010 is over.

M’Cheyne
This is the classic plan, designed by Robert Murray M’Cheyne (1813-1843), the well-remembered Scottish minister who died before his 30th birthday. The plan has readings for every day of the year and will take you once through the Old Testament and twice through the Psalms and the New Testament. (Don Carson’s daily devotionals called For the Love of God are based on the M’Cheyne plan.)

ESV Study Bible
Like the Discipleship Journal plan, the ESV Study Bible plan has you reading in four places: 1) Psalms and wisdom lit, 2) Pentateuch and Israel’s history, 3) Chronicles and prophets, and 4) Gospels and epistles.

Chronological
With a reading for each day of the year, this plan from Back to the Bible aims to take you through Scripture in chronological order.

Engage Scripture
This new plan from The Journey in St. Louis looks very good. Also check out The Journey’s Engage Scripture page for videos and pdfs giving background info on the biblical books, as Pastor Darrin Patrick takes his congregation through the Bible in 2010.

This week's sermon: "Praying in the Closet and in the Spirit"

Are you the disciplined type? Are you more spontaneous? What does the Bible say about how this relates to prayer?

This much is clear: Our various disciplines and spontaneities are Christian to the extent that they are an overflow of our confidence that God is already 100% on our side.

The gospel doesn't rule out spontaneity. "In the Spirit," Jesus' gospel-work for us often moves us to spontaneous prayer.

And the gospel doesn't rule our discipline. It moves us to plan for prayer "in the closet," and to take up various intentional disciplines as fruit of the gospel.

Faith in the gospel leads the Christian to planned private prayer in at least 3 ways:

1. Because we trust in Jesus as our Lord and know he is for us, we gladly do what he tells us.
2. Because we trust in Jesus as our Treasure, we have tasted and seen that he is good, and so we are eager to get more of him.
3. Because we trust in Jesus as our Savior, we know that every true need we have has been purchased for us already, and so we don't come to him in prayer to purchase but to receive.

Please join us in prayer for John Piper’s two sessions today at Passion 2010 in Atlanta. John is scheduled for a breakout session at 2 p.m. titled “A Sacred Ambition for the Glory of Christ Where He Is Not Yet Named.” The blurb for the session reads,

Do you share the apostle Paul's sacred ambition to bring the gospel to peoples who otherwise have no access to it? If you are ready to leverage your life for those among the world’s hardest and most unreached peoples then this breakout is for you.

Then John’s main session is tonight at 7:00, titled “Is Jesus an Egomaniac?”

John calls tonight’s word an updated version of his 1997 message at Passion that Lauren Chandler says helped her and her husband Matt have “ground to stand on when we heard the words, ‘brain cancer.’” Please join the Chandlers and us in praying that others would get ground for their feet as well.

The message should be available for playback as “Session Five” for 24 hours after it is posted (which should be soon after the session).

(Tweets from today’s sessions will be available at @PiperTravel and @NationsBeGlad.)

We’ve looked at Jesus’ full divinity under the heading “Jesus Is Lord” and his full humanity under “Jesus Is Savior.” Now we turn to his single personhood and utter uniqueness that makes him our soul-satisfying Treasure.

The term hypostatic union is much easier than it sounds, but the concept is as profound as anything in the universe—the personal union of the eternal Son of God with our humanity.

The English adjective hypostatic comes from the Greek word hupostasis. The word only appears four times in the New Testament—maybe most memorably in Hebrews 1:3, where Jesus is said to be “the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature.” Here the author of Hebrews uses the word in reference to the oneness of God. Both the Father and the Son are of the same “nature.” Jesus is “the exact imprint of his nature.”

However, in early church discussions, as Greek speakers tried to find agreeable terms with those who spoke in Latin, the word hupostasis came to denote not the sameness in the Godhead (the one divine essence) but the distinctness (the three divine persons). So it began to be used to refer to something like the English word person.

The Personal Union of Jesus’ Two Natures

So “hypostatic union” may sound fancy in English, but it’s a pretty simple term. Hypostatic means personal. The hypostatic union is the personal joining of Jesus’ two natures in one person.

Jesus has two complete natures—one fully human and one fully divine. What the doctrine of the hypostatic union teaches is that these two natures are united in one person in the God-man. Jesus is not two persons. He is one person. The hypostatic union is the joining of the divine and the human in the one person of Jesus.

What Is the Significance?

Why bother with this seemingly fancy term? What good is it to know about this hypostatic union? At the end of the day, the term can go, but the concept behind the term is infinitely precious—and worshipfully mind-stretching.

It is immeasurably sweet—and awe-inspiring—to know that Jesus’ two natures are perfectly united in his one person. Jesus is not divided. He is not two people. He is one person. As the Chalcedonian Creed (451 A.D.) states, his two natures are without confusion, without change, without division, and without separation. Jesus is one.

This means Jesus is one focal point for our worship. And as Jonathan Edwards preached, in this one-person God-man we find “an admirable conjunction of diverse excellencies.” Because of this hypostatic, one-person union, Jesus exhibits an unparalleled magnificence. No one person satisfies the complex longings of the human heart like the God-man.

God has made the human heart in such a way that it will never be eternally content with that which is only human. Finitude can’t slake our thirst for the infinite. And yet, in our finite humanity, we are significantly helped by a point of correspondence with the divine. God was glorious long before he became man in Jesus. But we are human, and unincarnate deity doesn’t connect with us in the same way as the God who became human. The conception of a god who never became man will not satisfy the human soul like the God who did.

One Person, For Us

And beyond just gazing at the spectacular person of Jesus, there is also the amazing gospel-laced revelation that the reason Jesus became the God-man was for us. His fully human nature joined in personal union to his eternally divine nature is a permanent showcase that Jesus, in perfect harmony with his Father, is undeterrably for us. He has demonstrated his love for us in that while we were still sinners, he took our nature to his one person and died for us.

(For more on the permanence of the incarnation, see “The Permanence of Christmas” Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.)

Yesterday we summed up Jesus’ full divinity under the heading “Jesus Is Lord.” We said that the doctrine of the incarnation could be remembered with John 1:14, “The Word became flesh.” That “Word” is the divine second person of the Trinity, the eternal Word, who we know as Jesus.

Today we shift focus to Jesus’ full humanity. Not only did he remain fully divine when he took humanity to himself, but the humanity that he took was full humanity. And so Jesus has a fully human body, emotions, mind, and will—and this in no way compromises his deity.

Jesus’ Human Body

It is clear enough from the New Testament that Jesus had (and still has) a fully human body. Jesus was born (Luke 2:7). He grew (Luke 2:40, 52). He grew tired (John 4:6) and got thirsty (John 19:28). He got hungry (Matthew 4:2) and was physically weak (Matthew 4:11; Luke 23:26). He died (Luke 23:46). And he had a real human body after his resurrection (Luke 24:39; John 20:20, 27). Jesus’ full humanity even became one of the first tests of orthodoxy (1 John 4:2).

Jesus’ Human Emotions

Throughout the gospels, Jesus clearly manifests human emotions.

• When Jesus heard the centurion’s words of faith, “he marveled” (Matthew 8:10).
• He says in Matthew 26:38 that his “soul is very sorrowful, even to death.”
• In John 11:33-35, Jesus is “deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled” and even weeps.
• John 12:27 says, “Now is my soul troubled,”
• In John 13:21, he is “troubled in his spirit.”
• The author to the Hebrews writes that “Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears” (Hebrews 5:7).

John Calvin memorably summed it up: “Christ has put on our feelings along with our flesh.”

Jesus’ Human Mind

Jesus also has a fully human mind (in addition to his fully divine mind). Two key texts make this undeniable:

• Luke 2:52 - “Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.”
• Mark 13:32 - “Concerning that day or that hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.”

The second text, of course, is striking. For those who clearly affirm Jesus’ deity, Mark 13:32 seems like trouble. But what looks difficult at first glance proves to be a glorious confirmation of Jesus’ humanity—and a very helpful piece in formulating our Christology.

If Jesus is God, and God knows everything, how can Jesus not know when his second coming will be?

Answer: In addition to being fully divine, Jesus is fully human. He has both an infinite, divine mind and a finite, human mind. He can be said not to know things because he is human and finite—human minds are not omniscient. And Jesus can be said to know all things (John 21:17) because he is divine and infinite in his knowledge.  There is a real sense in which the God-man is both omniscient (as God) and not omniscient (as man).

Paradoxical as it is, we affirm that Jesus both knows all things and doesn’t know all things. For the unique, two-natured person of Christ, this is no contradiction but a peculiar glory of the God-man.

Jesus’ Human Will

Now, trickiest of all, Jesus not only has a divine will but also a human will. That’s two wills—one divine and one human. Two key texts on Jesus’ human will:

• John 6:38 - “I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me.”
• Matthew 26:39 - “Not as I will, but as you will.”

Jesus has an infinite, divine will he shares with his Father, and he has a finite, human will that, while remaining an authentic human will, is moved in obedience into perfect sync with and submission to the divine will.

This Jesus is a spectacular person. He is utterly unique as fully God and fully man. And so there is only one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus (1 Timothy 2:5).

Fully Divine, Fully Human

Jesus has a human body, heart, mind, and will. He is like us in every respect——except for sin (Hebrews 2:17; 4:15). How amazing that the divine Son of God would not just take on part of our humanity but all of it—and then take that true humanity all the way to the cross for us.

Jesus took a human body to save our bodies. And he took a human mind to save our minds. Without becoming man in his emotions, he could not have saved our emotions. And without taking a human will, he could not save our will. In the words of Gregory of Nazianzus, “That which he has not assumed he has not healed.”

He became man in full so that he might save us in full. Hallelujah, what a Savior!

Tomorrow, we’ll look at Jesus’ single personhood.

Advent is my yearly reminder to brush up on Christology, the doctrine of the person of Christ. I’ve found it helpful to approach the subject under three headings:

1. Jesus as Lord (fully divine)
2. Jesus as Savior (fully human)
3. Jesus as Treasure (one person)

So here’s part 1, with parts 2 and 3 on the way in the next couple days.

In this Christological triad (Lord-Savior-Treasure), Jesus’ Lordship is tied to his divinity and to him rightly being called Yahweh, the name surpassingly more excellent than angels (Heb. 1:4), the name above every name (Phil. 2:9). Here’s the connection between Lordship and the divine name.

Yahweh, the Lord

God’s personal name Yahweh, first revealed to Moses at the burning bush, was so sacred to the ancient Hebrews that they would not risk mispronouncing it by speaking it. So every time they came across the name while reading their Scriptures (our “Old Testament”), they would say Adonai, meaning Lord. So when the Greek translation of the Scriptures was produced, Yahweh was rendered Kurios (Greek for Lord), and so in “New Testament” times, Jesus being called Kurios had the effect of identifying him with the divine name Yahweh.

The divinity of Jesus is pervasive in the New Testament and so fundamental that it is usually assumed among first-century Christians, rather than argued for. But Jesus being called Lord may be the strongest way the New Testament ascribes divinity to Jesus. There are times where Jesus is called God, other times Son of Man has divine connotations, other times there are clear attributes of deity, but page after page Jesus is called Lord—and being so called, he is identified with God’s personal name.

The Incarnation

What we celebrate at Christmas is that Yahweh himself, the eternal God in the second person of the Trinity became man. We call this the incarnation, which refers literally to the in-fleshing of the Son of God—Jesus taking humanity to his person, being clothed, as it were, in human flesh. The doctrine of the incarnation teaches that the divine second person of the Trinity took on humanity in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, not by losing any of his divinity, but by adding humanity to himself. A helpful way to remember this heart of the incarnation—the divine adding the human—is John 1:14: “The Word became flesh.”

The Incarnation and the Cross

So the eternal Son of God, without ceasing to be God but remaining fully divine, took on full humanity. And what a magnificent doctrine and fuel for worship this is! Jesus didn’t just become man because he could. It wasn’t just a showoff move. He became man “for us and for our salvation” (in the words of Athanasius). The Word became flesh to save us from our sin and to free us to marvel at and enjoy the person in whom there is this unique union of divinity and humanity.

The incarnation is an eternal testimony that the fully divine Son and his Father are unswervingly for us.

Tomorrow we’ll look at Jesus’ full humanity.

This week’s sermon: “You Have the Words of Eternal Life”

Christmas is all about Good Friday. The reason the eternal Word became flesh (John 1:14) is that he needed flesh to suffer and die. God becoming man is the only way that grace could come to sinners. The gospel is the great message of Christmas.

John 6 is a rough chapter. It begins with 5,000 following Jesus, and ends with only 11. But there are rays of hope.

One ray is verse 63 where Jesus says, “The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.” The second ray is Peter, who when asked if he would go away with the 5,000, responds in verse 68, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

His answer implies that he had considered going elsewhere. Jesus’ words to the crowds were tough. But Peter had been gripped by the Holy Spirit. He had been given life in Jesus’ words. And though numerous questions remained, he knew there was no one like this Jesus and no words of eternal life like he spoke.

This week's sermon: "It Is the Spirit That Gives Life"

John 6 appears to end with failure. The story begins with 5,000 men following Jesus, but by the end, only the disciples remain—and one of them, Jesus says, is a devil. That's just 11 left, if you're keeping score at home.

But in the seeming failure, amidst the growing resistance, Jesus and John conspire to teach us this overarching lesson: When it appears that resistance to Jesus is winning, God's people need a view of the sovereignty of God over all things—including the resistance.

Jesus isn't handcuffed by the unbelieving responses. No one can come to him unless his Father draws them, he answers. And he isn't thwarted even by Satan slithering in among his 12 disciples. He himself is the one who chose them, he says, knowing full well what Judas would become.

As the grumbling escalates to all-out resistance, and the myriads of once adoring followers disappear, Jesus' message becomes clearer and clearer: The resistance itself is in God's hands. He can overcome it any time he chooses. The devil is not in charge. And man is not in charge. God is in charge.

This week's sermon: "They Will All Be Taught of God"

Jesus says in John 6:44, "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him." Both the immediate and distant contexts in the Gospel of John clarify and confirm that Jesus means here that everyone who God draws comes.

But the most serious objection to this is John 12:32, where Jesus says, "[W]hen I am lifted up . . . [I] will draw all people to myself." Is this a different tune than 6:44? How do these two fit together?

What several texts in John's Gospel make plain is that all in 12:32 refers to all of Christ's sheep, or all of the children of God, rather than all human beings in the world.

Running straight through the Gospel of John is the truth that God the Father and God the Son decisively draw people out of darkness into light. Jesus died for this. And what John 12:32 adds is that this happens today in history by pointing the whole world to the crucified Jesus and preaching the good news that whoever believes on him will be saved. In that preaching of the crucified Christ, God opens the ears of the deaf. His sheep hear his voice and follow.

Which leads to how God does this drawing: by a kind of teaching. The drawn are the taught. Jesus uses at least three phrases to describe how the Father draws people: "being taught," "hearing from" God, and "learning from" God.

Jesus came into the world as the fullest revelation of the glory of God. To see him as glorious and to come to him is what the world needs more than anything. What everyone needs is to "know the Lord"—that is, to know that God Almighty, creator of heaven and earth and Lord of the universe, is incarnate in Jesus Christ. We need to be taught by God that Jesus is who he says he is.

This week's sermon: "Skeptical Grumbling and Sovereign Grace"

John 6:44 is controversial. Jesus says, "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him."

Jesus' words could be taken in two different directions. On the one hand, it could mean that God draws everyone and not all come, so God isn't decisive but the human will. Or, on the other hand, it could mean that everyone God draws comes.

Five other passages in the Gospel of John (6:37, 63­65; 8:47; 10:26­27;12:37­40) clarify and confirm that Jesus means the latter, that everyone God draws comes. (A common objection is John 12:32—to be treated next time.)

If this is what Jesus means, then why does he say it? He says it to stop his questioners' grumbling and point them to prayer that God would do the decisive work that only he can do in his sovereign, undeserved grace—grace that has at least 5 effects on its recipients:

1. It humbles them.
2. It fills them with thankfulness.
3. It gives them assurance.
4. It gives them hope for the conversion of the people they love who seem utterly beyond hope.
5. It gives all glory to God, not to them.

What is the most important principle for productivity? Our Director of Strategy Matt Perman answers,

I would actually say: realize that you don't have to be productive. By this I mean: your significance does not come from your productivity. It comes from Christ, who obeyed God perfectly on our behalf such that our significance and standing before God comes from him, not anything we do. Then, on that basis, we pursue good works (which is what productivity is) and do so eagerly, as it says in Titus 2:14.

Read the full 3-question interview that this comes from.

This week's sermon: "Behold, Believe, Be Raised"

The crowds ate Jesus' multiplied bread and were filled. But the next day, their stomachs were again empty, and their query to Jesus made it plain that they had missed the point of the loaves—that Jesus is the Bread of Life.

Jesus answered their request, which alluded to Moses and wilderness manna, with a double denial and an amazing offer. Denials: It was not Moses who gave the manna but God; and the ultimate point of the manna was not full tummies but something bigger—the "true bread" coming from heaven. Amazing offer: "My Father gives you the true bread from heaven."

Don't miss the word "you." Most of the crowd is not going to receive it. But Jesus says that God is giving it. This is the way Christians go to the world and speak to the world: "God has given you the bread of life. He offers it to you. It is free. Take it. Eat it."

Jesus then says explicitly that he is the one they hunger for: "I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst." Jesus and all that God is for us in him is what we hunger and thirst for, and saving faith is being satisfied in him.

Verses 37-­40 then make at least 5 statements of God's sovereign working:

1. God gives his chosen ones to Jesus.
2. Because God gives them to Jesus, they come to Jesus.
3. Those who are given to Jesus and come to Jesus are omnipotently and eternally kept by Jesus. None is lost.
4. Jesus will raise us from the dead on the last day.
5. Finally, the unshakeable foundation for all this sovereign work of God—his giving, our coming, his keeping, his raising—the unshakeable foundation of it all (mentioned three times lest we miss it!) is the will of God.

This week’s sermon: “Do Not Labor for the Food That Perishes”

Jesus isn’t eager to be useful to our natural desires. He’s too loving to be content with us seeing him as anything less than our supreme Treasure.

So the Gospel of John was written to make known the glory of Jesus, not the glory of his gifts. The story points again and again to the person of faith, not the product of religion.

Jesus tells us in John 6:27 not to labor for the bread that perishes but for the food that endures to eternal life.

Laboring for the enduring food does not mean earning his favor. Rather, Jesus turns our inclination for doing upside down. This is what we're required to do: Believe in Jesus. It’s a kind of doing that isn’t doing. Those who eat the enduring food, Jesus himself who is the Bread of Life, don’t work to earn him but believe to receive him.

But what does it mean not to labor for the food that perishes? Stop working altogether? Quit our jobs? No, but our jobs should be changed. When Jesus is our highest Treasure something about everything changes. And the effect isn’t lazy, sloppy, gloomy labor, but zealous, excellent, joyful work that magnifies the beauty of our Bread and gladly meets the needs of others.

This week's sermon: “Twelve Baskets of Bread and the Walk on Water”

Jesus walks on the water—an amazing story, of course. So it’s remarkable that John’s Gospel has nothing more to say about it in John 6 or the rest of the Gospel. John returns to the storyline about the bread and feeding 5,000 from earlier in the chapter. Why no long dialogue about Jesus’ water-walking ability?

The reason is that water-walking, impressive as it is, isn’t the most important thing about Jesus. More important is that he is the Bread who satisfies the souls not only of those sitting on the grass who the disciples served, but the souls of the ones in the boat—the disciples—as well. Jesus is the one who comes to them in the storm, the one who they welcome with joy into the boat, and the one whose presence is the miraculous gift

When Jesus climbs into the boat and stills the storm, he is showing the disciples (and us) the point that underlies his feeding of the 5,000: When we serve Jesus by giving of ourselves to others, he will always be enough for us. If we pour out our life to provide bread for others, he will be our bread. The more we satisfy others, the more he will satisfy us.

Jesus’ presence, and the satisfaction that only he can give, brings the kind of fullness that produces generosity and risk-taking in his disciples and in his church.