Am I My Brother’s Keeper?

At the heart of the word “courage” are ideas of boldness, fortitude and resolve. These three closely related words together provide a robust understanding of courage. Boldness is the confidence to take a risk – initial courage. Fortitude is the firmness of the mind without retreat – sustaining courage. Resolve is the determination to reach the end goal – persevering courage.

Courage is often expressed in word pictures of battle, conflict or crisis (insert a William Wallace freedom cry here) so that a “courageous” person will face an opponent even if victory looks bleak. But what about the courage to speak truth in love though it may cut to the heart (Acts 2:37; John 6:60)? It requires courage to call out friends for living lives that do not resemble the faith they profess.

When lacking the courage to speak plainly and with conviction, we often say nothing, call it mercy and let the opportunity pass. Passivity counterfeits for patience. Cowardice masquerades as grace.

Instead of recognizing that our fear of man cripples us to silence, we convince ourselves that we are gracious people. But the problem is that leaving someone in sin is not grace or love; it is consent, indifference and, quite honestly, unloving.

Grace is frequently misunderstood to mean overlooking wrong, when true grace could not be further removed from this misconception. Grace is not rejecting someone when they sin or overlooking sin in a person’s life. It’s having the courage of conviction to call someone out when they sin and to do so in love. Grace is a commitment to bring to light what is in darkness (1 John 1:5-10).

There have been many times in the past where I have overlooked sin in a brother and called it grace. Instead of leading them out of sin, I let them stay in their sin, which corrupts and decays. This is not an act of love but an act of cowardice.

Genuine grace transforms. True grace never overlooks. It is remarkable, and when you see it, you know it. Grace never leaves you the same.

If we quench the voice of the Spirit long enough, we can become numb to His leadings and thereby render our selves useless to our brothers and sisters in the church. We must regain our sense of conviction and be bold, strong and resolved to stand courageously with other believers when we see sin in their lives (Heb. 3:13). This is true love.

It is time to leave coward ways behind and become mature men and women marked by conviction and courage. Are we willing to be bold and initiate conversations with our brothers and sisters who are not living out the faith they profess? Are we willing to show fortitude and to pursue those who are unwilling to change? Are we committed to not letting one in the flock go astray?

After the infamous fratricide in Genesis 4, the Lord comes to Cain asking where his brother is. Cain projects his guilt in his response to the Lord: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” The reality is this: He was his brother’s keeper. And I am my brother’s keeper. You are your brother’s keeper. You are your sister’s keeper. We are to look after one another, speaking truth in love (Eph. 4:15). We are to shine the light of Christ into the dark places, especially if that dark place is your brother or sister.

Scriptures for Further Reading

• 1 Samuel 15:1-35 (Samuel and Saul)
• 2 Samuel 12:1-31 (Nathan Rebukes David)
• Ephesians 4:25
• 1 Thessalonians 5:11, 14-15
• Galatians 6:1-2
• Hebrews 3:7-15
• Hebrews 10:24
• James 5:16
• 2 Corinthians 7:1-13

Originally posted on The Village Church’s blog by Clint Patronella here: http://ow.ly/cvCnI

Conflict, Convenience, and Default Priorities

As a general rule, if something can be made more convenient, we opt for it. If there is a device to facilitate that convenience, we buy it. If there is a program to sustain that simplicity and shallowness of effort exerted on our part, then we call it productive, efficient and welcome. However, for all the convenience, our lives are no richer. Some say the quality of your life is impoverished by the very devices, programs and conveniences you have incorporated into daily routines.

In his work, Living into Focus: Choosing What Matters in an Age of Distractions, Arthur Boers describes our tendency to confuse standard of living with wealth, to lose sight of the depth of life for the speed of it. Below are two passages from Boers, each followed by questions for reflection. After answering the questions, take a few moments to think through how your daily choices may actually detract from your depth of life and what might need to change in order to sow seeds of richness back into it.

We are all well advised to avoid handling conflicts by email. Issues requiring more than two paragraphs of explanation most likely should be dealt with in person. If annoyed or angry, do not respond for at least twenty-four hours. You might draft a written rejoinder, but do not finalize or deliver it. Once you write something, wait another twenty-four hours. (Since your “delayed” response may increase anxiety, consider sending a short acknowledgement that promises to respond when you have time to do so appropriately.) Extra time gives opportunity to gain perspective, perhaps even see how your response might be heard or read by someone else. It will also encourage you to pay attention to important matters that you may have missed in the sender’s email, to let go of aspects of the problem that you do not need to put on the record, and perhaps make room to be more gracious in how you deal with the provocation. You might also want a trusted friend or colleague to read what you write before you send it. (p. 115)

Do you notice a tendency in yourself to defer to typing rather than talking through tough conversations?

Are you more prone to boldness through text than in person? Whom does that care for more: you or the person you are trying to communicate with?

Our lives are increasingly shaped in ways that disconnect us. It is common for face-to-face conversations to be interrupted by cell phones. Such devices have a dominating and intrusive presence. One school where I taught restricted cell phone use to certain areas because people employing such devices—whether in halls, classrooms, or lounges—tend to speak with more volume than usual and thus dominate and even inhibit work, study, or conversations around them. Calls interrupt meals, hospitality, and meetings. We no longer see this as rude; gadgets are our default priority. (p. 127)

What about your technology habits devalues your conversations and relationships?

Are you more connected to people through the phone or across the table at mealtime?

Where are you spending time, energy and mental gifting on things that have little to no eternal consequence?

How can you spend that time with your spouse, children, biblical community or co-workers this week?

Posted originally at The Village Church blog by Mason King here: http://ow.ly/cs0j7

Darkness & Light (Spurgeon)

“And God divided the light from the darkness.” (Genesis 1:4)

A believer has two principles at work within him. In his natural estate he was subject to one principle only, which was darkness; now light has entered, and the two principles disagree. Mark the apostle Paul’s words in the seventh chapter of Romans: “I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: but I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin, which is in my members.”

How is this state of things occasioned?

“The Lord divided the light from the darkness.” Darkness, by itself, is quiet and undisturbed, but when the Lord sends in light, there is a conflict for the one is in opposition to the other: a conflict which will never cease till the believe is altogether light in the Lord. If there be a division within the individual Christian, there is certain to be a division without. So soon as the Lord gives to any man light, he proceeds to separate himself from the darkness around; he secedes from a merely worldly religion of outward ceremonial, for nothing short of the gospel of Christ will now satisfy him, and he withdraws himself from worldly society and frivolous amusements, and seeks the company of the saints, for “We know we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren.”

The light gathers to itself, and the darkness to itself. What God has divided, let us never try to unite, but as Christ went [outside/away from] the camp, bearing His reproach, so let us come out from the ungodly, and be a peculiar people. He was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners; and, as He was, so we are to be nonconformists to the world, dissenting from all sin, and distinguished from the rest of mankind by our likeness to our Master.

~ C.H. Spurgeon (from Morning and Evening, a daily devotional; paragraphing added)

7 Marks of a Right Heart Before God

1) A right heart is a NEW heart (Ezek. 36:26). It is not the heart with which a person is born—but another heart put in them by the Holy Spirit. It is a heart which has new tastes, new joys, new sorrows, new desires, new hopes, new fears, new likes, new dislikes. It has new views about the soul, sin, God, Christ, salvation, the Bible, prayer, heaven, hell, the world, and holiness. It is like a farm with a new and good tenant. “Old things are passed away. Behold all things are become new” (2 Cor. 5:17).

2) A right heart is a BROKEN and CONTRITE heart (Psalm 51:17). It is broken off from pride, self-conceit, and self-righteousness. Its former high thoughts of self are cracked, shattered, and shivered to atoms. It thinks itself guilty, unworthy, and corrupt. Its former stubbornness, heaviness, and insensibility have thawed, disappeared, and passed away. It no longer thinks lightly of offending God. It is tender, sensitive, and jealously fearful of running into sin (2 Kings 22:19). It is humble, lowly, and self-abased, and sees in itself no good thing.

3) A right heart is a heart which BELIEVES on Christ alone for salvation, and in which Christ dwells by faith (Rom. 10:10; Eph. 3:17). It rests all its hopes of pardon and eternal life on Christ’s atonement, Christ’s mediation, and Christ’s intercession. It is sprinkled in Christ’s blood from an evil conscience (Heb. 10:22). It turns to Christ as the compass-needle turns to the north. It looks to Christ for daily peace, mercy, and grace—as the sun-flower looks to the sun. It feeds on Christ for its daily sustenance, as Israel fed on the manna in the wilderness. It sees in Christ a special fitness to supply all its needs and requirements. It leans on Him, hangs on Him, builds on Him, cleaves to Him, as its physician, guardian, husband, and friend.

4) A right heart is a PURIFIED heart (Acts 15:9; Matt. 5:8). It loves holiness, and hates sin. It strives daily to cleanse itself from all filthiness of flesh and spirit (2 Cor. 7:1). It abhors that which is evil, and cleaves to that which is good. It delights in the law of God, and has that law engraved on it, that it may not forget it (Psalm 119:11). It longs to keep the law more perfectly, and takes pleasure in those who love the law. It loves God and people. Its affections are set on things above. It never feels so light and happy as when it is most holy; and it looks forward to heaven with joy, as the place where perfect holiness will at length be attained.

5) A right heart is a PRAYING heart. It has within it “the Spirit of adoption whereby we cry, Abba Father” (Rom. 8:15). Its daily feeling is, “Your face, Lord, will I seek” (Psalm 27:8). It is drawn by an habitual inclination to speak to God about spiritual things—weakly, feebly, and imperfectly perhaps—but speak it must. It finds it necessary to pour out itself before God, as before a friend, and to spread before Him all its needs and desires. It tells Him all its secrets. It keeps back nothing from Him. You might as well try to persuade a person to live without breathing, as to persuade the possessor of a right heart to live without praying.

6) A right heart is a heart that feels CONFLICT within it (Gal. 5:17). It finds within itself two opposing principles contending for the mastery—the flesh lusting against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. It knows by experience what Paul means when he says, “I see a law in my members warring against the law of my mind” (Rom. 7:23). The wrong heart knows nothing of this strife. The strong man armed keeps the wrong heart as their palace, and their goods are at peace (Luke 11:21). But when the rightful King takes possession of the heart, a struggle begins which never ends until death. The right heart may be known by its warfare, quite as much as by its peace.

7) A right heart is HONEST, UNDIVIDED, and TRUE (Luke 8:15;1 Chron. 12:33; Heb. 10:22). There is nothing about it of falsehood, hypocrisy, or image-acting. It is not double or divided. It really is what it professes to be, feels what it professes to feel, and believes what it professes to believe. Its faith may be feeble. Its obedience may be very imperfect. But one thing will always distinguish the right heart. Its religion will be real, genuine, thorough, and sincere.

 ► Summary:

A heart such as that which I have now described, has always been the possession of all true Christians of every name, nation, people and tongue. They have differed from one another on many subjects—but they have all been of a right heart. Some of them have fallen, for a season, like David and Peter—but their hearts have never entirely departed from the Lord. They have often proved themselves to be men and women laden with infirmities—but their hearts have been right in the sight of God. They have understood one another on earth. They have found that their experience was everywhere one and the same. They will understand each other even better in the world to come. All that have had right hearts upon earth, will find that they have one heart when they enter heaven.
~ J.C. Ryle [Old Paths, “The Heart” (348-351)].