iStinkatDevotions.com

No Compromise: The Life Story of Keith Green, by Melody Green
I started it today and I could hardly put it down.
When the guitarist Phil Keaggy performed at Wheaton College this past fall, he covered Keith Green’s song “Your Love Broke Through.” I’m not sure if I had heard that song before, but Phil’s performance really resonated with me–in fact, I jotted down a line of the lyrics during the concert so that I could look up the song afterwards. Later, I read a little bit about “Your Love Broke Through” and Keith Green’s ministry, and watched a documentary biography about it on Youtube that someone had actually recommended to me a few months earlier. During winter break, between the fall and spring semesters, I came across an easy solo piano arrangement of “Oh Lord, You’re Beautiful” in my music collection. The melody and words resonated with me again, so I looked up more of Keith Green’s music on Youtube and listened to “Asleep in the Light,” “There is a Redeemer,” “Create in me a Clean Heart,” and some other songs.

Paul exhorted the Philippians to “take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you.” Learning about the grace that God gave to Keith and Melody Green has been a great blessing to me, and God has used some of Keith’s music to draw near to me and to move my spirit to worship. I expect that this book will be inspirational to me as well.

Another book that was recommended to me by a youth leader and one that I’d also like to read this summer is Pleasures Evermore: The Life-Changing Power of Enjoying God, by Sam Storms. I’m not sure what all’s in it yet, but I respect the guy who recommended it to me, and I respect the three leaders promoting the book on its back cover: J.I. Packer, John Piper, and Jerry Bridges.

I have been reading through many of the Psalms lately.

I have been starting college at Wheaton (IL) as a freshman, and have hardly had time to even check my e-mail.
My devotions have still been pretty consistent, though.

Exciting things have been happening. I attended a program for incoming freshmen to get to know each other a week before school started. Orientation week had its ups and downs, but the first days of classes went well. Through all of this, I have had some interesting devotions. Also, I have realized that it’s best to do devotions early in the morning before classes start.

This month my goal is to read through the book of Proverbs.

Soon after finishing “Respectable Sins” (see post below), I read through “The Practice of the Presence of God with Spiritual Maxims” of Brother Lawrence. Lawrence (born Nicholas Herman) was a Frenchman who lived part of his life in a monastery during the seventeenth century. You can read a biography about him here.

I was encouraged by Brother Lawrence’s words and example of loving God. Here are some of my favorite quotes from the book.

“[It is] a shameful thing to quit His conversation to think of trifles and fooleries.”
“[In] order to form a habit of conversing with God continually, and referring all we do to Him, we must first apply to Him with some diligence… [After] a little care we should find His love inwardly excited us to it without any difficulty.”
“[It is] a great delusion to think that the times of prayer ought to differ from other times… [We] are as strictly obliged to adhere to God by action in the time of action as by prayer in the season of prayer.”
“Pray remember what I have recommended to you, which is, to think often on God, by day, by night, in your business, and even in your diversions. He is always near you and with you; leave Him not alone. You would think it rude to leave a friend alone who came to visit you; why, then, must God be neglected? Do not, then, forget Him, but think on Him often, adore Him continually, live and die with Him; this is the glorious employment of a Christian.”
“We must hinder our spirits’ wandering from him upon any occasion. We must make our heart a spiritual temple, wherein to adore Him incessantly. We must watch continually over ourselves, that we may not do nor say nor think anything that may displease Him.”
“You are young, my brethren; profit therefore I beseech you from my confession, that I cared too little to employ my early years for God. Consecrate all yours to His Love. If I had only known Him sooner, if I had only had some one to tell me then what I am telling you, I should not have so long delayed in loving Him. Believe me, count as lost each day you have not used in loving God.”

I recommend this book if you are struggling to apply the commands “Pray continually” (I Thessalonians 5:17), “Set your heart and mind on things above” (Colossians 3:1-2), and “Be clear minded and self-controlled so that you can pray” (I Peter 4:7).

Brother Lawrence wrote much about the power of prayer, but he did not write about how Scripture changes (sanctifies) us. This was the only weakness that I found in his message. Jesus knew the transforming power of Scripture when he prayed for his disciples in John 17:17, “Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.” I thank God for really changing my thoughts and attitude by reading and thinking about verses and passages in the Bible–I know some of the sanctifying power that Jesus prayed for.

In John 4:24, Jesus declared, “God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.” Prayer is important, but studying the Word cannot be neglected. Of course, I gave Brother Lawrence grace while I read because he was a monk–I expect that he did know the Bible well.

If you’re interested in this book, go ahead and read it. Just remember that one weakness I wrote about, and then be encouraged and challenged by the main message.

I finished reading through Nehemiah. It was an interesting book.

This part from the last chapter was surprising to me:

23 Moreover, in those days I saw men of Judah who had married women from Ashdod, Ammon and Moab. 24 Half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod or the language of one of the other peoples, and did not know how to speak the language of Judah. 25 I rebuked them and called curses down on them. I beat some of the men and pulled out their hair. I made them take an oath in God’s name and said: “You are not to give your daughters in marriage to their sons, nor are you to take their daughters in marriage for your sons or for yourselves. (NIV)

Matthew Henry’s Commentary explained, “Nehemiah showed the evil of these marriages. Some, more obstinate than the rest, he smote, that is, ordered them to be beaten by the officers according to the law, De 25:2, 3.”

So Nehemiah wasn’t sinning when he punished these men, he was obeying the law. (Any more commentary on these verses is welcome.)

Before this incident, Nehemiah did some other things in the chapter to obey God: he kicked Tobiah, an Ammonite official who opposed Nehemiah’s effort to build the wall around Jerusalem (4:7, 6:19), out of a room in the temple (13:8); he “rebuked the officials” for neglecting to pay the Levites and the singers; he “rebuked the nobles of Judah” for working on the Sabbath, and even went so far as to shut up the gates of Jerusalem “so that no load could be brought in on the Sabbath day.”

I was thinking about some application from this chapter. Now Christians are not under the rules of the law, but we are commanded to “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.” (Colossians 3:16 (NIV)) We are to admonish or warn each other when we detect sin. But we are also to obey Paul’s advice to Timothy: “And the Lord’s servant must not quarrel; instead, he must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. Those who oppose him he must gently instruct, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will.” (II Timothy 2:24-26)

These are some of my thoughts that I had while reading Nehemiah. Any comments are welcome.