King David: Lousy Father

After David’s affair with Bathsheba, Nathan the prophet announces God’s judgment on him (2 Sam 12:10): “Now therefore the sword shall never depart from your house.” It’s pretty depressing to read about the unfolding fulfillment of that word.

In 2 Samuel 13, David’s son Amnon rapes his half-sister Tamar. The king is “very angry” (13:21), but apparently takes no action. (Was he reluctant to condemn Amnon’s sin because of his own sexual failures?) Two years later, David’s son Absalom, Tamar’s full brother, takes matters into his own hands and has Amnon killed in retaliation.

Once again, David declines to respond to his son’s actions. Absalom flees to Geshur, and David neither punishes him nor allows him to return home for three years. David is finally persuaded to let Absalom return to Jerusalem (chapter 14), but still refuses to see him.

Absalom’s resulting bitterness pushes him to attempt to take David’s throne by force (chapter 15), bringing on a civil war that ends in Absalom’s death (15-18). His death leaves David grief-stricken, which is an insult to the soldiers who have risked their lives to save his kingdom; this means the people are slower to accept David’s return to power (19), and it weakens the monarchy, sowing the beginnings of the split that will come in the reign of David’s grandson (1 Kings 12).

If David had been leading his household well, he never would have taken Bathsheba or had her husband killed. He wouldn’t have failed to discipline the son who raped his half-sister, and likely Absalom wouldn’t have felt the need to avenge her. (What did Tamar think of her father’s failure to respond to her rape?) He wouldn’t have failed in his discipline of Absalom and thereby turned his son’s heart against him. He wouldn’t have had to grieve the loss of a son with whom he was never reconciled.

God, make me a man who’s unashamed to lead his family. Make me a husband who cleaves fast to his wife, and a father who’s not afraid to discipline his children for their good.  And in my many failures as a husband and father, remind me of David, the lousy husband and father who was counted righteous not because of his own works, but because of your great mercy.

Piper on Drama and Movies in Worship

John Piper:

I think the use of video and drama largely is a token of unbelief in the power of preaching.

Read the whole thing. Not only because he’s right, but because he distinguishes well between biblical command and personal practice.

Jonah’s Lousy Preaching (And Ours)

Imagine the sermon Jonah could have preached in Ninevah.

He’s received a call from God that he promptly disobeyed, which ended up in him getting a discount ticket to Davy Jones’ locker– only to be rescued (!) by being swallowed by a giant fish. (Given the choice between drowning and digestion, I’m going with drowning any day of the week.) With three days and nights to reconsider, he not surprisingly had a change of heart. So did the fish, which means Jonah found himself back on dry land, albeit reeking of fish vomit.

So in 3:1, when God’s call comes to him a second time, he’s a disobedient prophet who’s been rescued from death at least twice by God’s mercy. Again, imagine the sermon he could have preached when he finally went to Ninevah: “Listen, God is a forgiving God! You are rebelling against him– and so was I. But he forgave me, and he’ll forgive you if you repent and cry out to him.” Pretty compelling stuff.

Instead, he says something like “Forty days and Ninevah will be destroyed.” (He almost certainly said more than this, but that’s an accurate summary.) Then he heads out of town so he can have a front-row seat for the fireworks show he’s certain is coming. You don’t get the sense that his message came from much of a heart of compassion for his hearers.

That’s what makes the response of the Ninevites so amazing. You can almost hear the surprise in the narrator’s voice in 3:5: “And the Ninevites believed God.” Apparently this means that they believe that Jonah really is speaking for God, and that God really will bring the promised disaster. So they respond appropriately, in repentance and faith, with prayer and fasting (even the animals, just in case). And, surprisingly to us but entirely consistent with his character, God relents of the disaster he was going to send. Ninevah is forgiven!

God used the halfhearted preaching of a disobedient prophet who hated the people he was preaching to to bring about a revival in one of the most wicked cities on earth. If he’ll do that, we should believe that he’ll use our witness– whether in preaching, teaching, or informal conversation– even in our sin, even in our timidity, even in our halfheartedness– to bring people to faith and repentance. It depends, as Paul said (Rom 9:16), not on human will or exertion, but on God who has mercy.

Our bad.

Secretary of State Clinton:

We acknowledge now with President Obama that we have made mistakes in the United States, and we along with other developed countries have contributed most significantly to the problem that we face with climate change.

As exciting as the never-ending Obama Apology Tour is, isn’t it a little bit ironic that this was said in a country where over a billion people are burning their trash?

Sermon audio available

The sermon I preached at Uptown Church last week is available for download (right-click & “save as”): “Where No Man Has Gone Before: Paul’s Missionary Vision (Rom 15:14-33)”.

Calvin at 500

My pastor is working on a PhD on Calvin. One time he heard about a Calvin conference going on just a couple of hours away, so he signed up. He was excited to hear about new developments in Calvin studies, probably learn some things he didn’t know that would help with his research. Instead, the big items of discussion were things like petitioning the government for a John Calvin postage stamp. He left early. He told us “I felt like I was at a Star Wars convention or something.”

That’s the wrong way to honor somebody like Calvin. The right way is to be thankful for how he served God, and to continue to learn from him. Calvin was one of the most brilliant minds in church history, uniquely used of God to strip away a lot of the unbiblical baggage the church had accumulated by the Middle Ages. Whether you’re a Presbyterian or a Methodist or a Pentecostal or whatever, it’s unlikely you would have heard the gospel, the real gospel, if it weren’t for Calvin.

Today is the 500th anniversary of John Calvin’s birth. I’m putting some links below to stuff I’ve done before, stuff people are posting today that I run across, and some places for general info on him. The point is not to say “Calvin is great,” but to say “Thank you, God, for servants like Calvin who help us understand your Word better.”

Earlier posts here on Calvin:

• Reading plan for Institutes of the Christian Religion.
• Calvin on how we’re easily led away from the things of God.
• Calvin on Patience.
• On Calvin getting a bad rap.

Posts from elsewhere:

• Kevin DeYoung: Calvin shows us how to be relevant 500 years later. (Via JT)
• Abraham Piper at the DG Blog: Celebrating Calvin for Christ.
• Calvin’s Wikipedia bio, which isn’t perfect but isn’t bad at all.
• Dr. Frank James: The Calvin I Never Knew, a great lecture. (Opens in iTunes.)
• Also from Frank James: Calvin the Evangelist. Blows up some stereotypes. Calvin sent out a lot more missionaries than the guys who say that Calvinism kills missions.
• Piper’s biographical talk on Calvin.
• My friend James-Michael, who’s not a Calvinist, has a good summary of his contributions and also of the “five points of Calvinism:” Happy Birthday John Calvin – from a non-Calvinist. (Did you know that Calvin basically invented the modern commentary?)

Ultimately right, proximately stupid.

President Obama this morning:

The future does not belong to those who gather armies on a field of battle or bury missiles in the ground.

One day that will be proven right. It will not be because of Obama’s brilliance.

Sarah and Michael

Two people especially were in the news last week. One is a middle-class mother of five, including a soldier in Iraq and a special-needs baby. She’s been married to the same man for over 20 years, and has had a pretty remarkable public career while simultaneously helping raise her family. She was in the news because she announced she would resign from her job after a year of the most hateful, subhuman attacks on her family you could imagine.

The other was a singer. He made the best-selling album in history over 25 years ago. Since then he had engaged in a long, slow, public free-fall. He had 2 brief marriages. He was quite possibly a child molester, and certainly known for all sorts of bizarre and personally destructive behavior. He was in the news because he died of a heart attack, apparently brought on by an overdose of a powerful drug his doctor illegally obtained for him.

The difference in the media’s and the public’s treatment of these two people is a great illustration of how royally screwed up our country is.

Honduras From the Inside

As you may have read, there’s been some political unrest in Honduras. Actually, there’s been a peaceful, constitutional proceeding to remove a wannabe dictator. Our president, who hasn’t been able to bring himself to say or do much on the Iran front, was quick to take the side of said wannabe dictator (joining Chavez and Castro). So much for not meddling in other countries’ affairs.

At any rate, our friends Sean and Lindsey are missionaries in La Ceiba, Honduras. They have a couple of blog posts with an insider’s take on the action this week– they even attended a peaceful demonstration and have pictures. Check it out.

Happy Canada Day, Eh?!

Things I appreciate about our neighbors to the north:

• Robbie Robertson.
• Their health plan– a great boon to the economies of US cities just across the border.
• Chris Farley.
• D. A. Carson.
• Crown Royal. (It’s between this and Robbie Robertson for #1.)

But seriously, Canadian bacon? It’s ham, guys. Ham. And let’s just be honest– if we run out of room down here, that whole “longest unfortified border in the world” isn’t gonna help.

Happy day, y’know!