Quotable: Study as an act of love

"Careful study is necessary. Without study, spirituality becomes sappy. Without spirituality, study becomes self-indulgent. And without the two walking together, prayer ends up limping along in sighs and stutters. Exegesis is necessary because we have a written word to attend to. It's God's Word, or so we believe, and we had better get it right. Exegesis is foundational to Christian spirituality. Foundations disappear from view as a building is constructed, but if the builders don't build a solid foundation, the building doesn't last long. Too many Bible readers assume that exegesis is what you do after you've learned Greek and Hebrew. That's simply not true. Exegesis is nothing more than a careful and loving reading of the text in our mother tongue. Greek and Hebrew are well worth learning, but if you haven't had the privilege, settle for English. Once we learn to love this text and bring a disciplined intelligence to it, we won't be far behind the very best Greek and Hebrew scholars. Appreciate the learned Scripture scholars, but don't be intimidated by them. Exegesis is the furthest thing from an impersonal act of scholarship; it is an intensely personal act of love. It loves the one who speaks the words enough to want to get them right. Exegesis is loving God enough to stop and listen carefully to what he says. It follows that we bring the leisure and attentiveness of lovers to this text, cherishing every comma and semicolon, relishing the oddness of this preposition, delighting in the surprising placement of this noun. Lovers don't take a quick look, get a "message" or a "meaning," and then run off and talk endlessly with their friends about how they feel."

From the book The Invitation: A Simple Guide to the Bible by by Eugene H. Peterson

God isn't a vending machine

One of the things I’ve been working on in my spare time is a writing project on the strange side of the Christian subculture when it comes to dating and singleness. I may eventually turn it into a book if I can find enough to say. One of the sections I’ve been working on lately is on questionable advice for finding a partner. A common sentiment out there I deal with in it is the idea that God will send along a partner as soon as you become fully content in God and with being single. Although there is some quite severe flaws in using contentment as a tool to get something, sometimes the logic is tempting.

It is tempting to think that we can do the right things and God will come through with giving us what we want. It seems like a relatively easy and very neat solution to our perceived problems.This doesn’t just apply when it comes to finding a partner. It might take the form of “give lots of money and God will bless you materially” or “Be really holy and God will heal you.” or “be dedicated to serving God and he will make sure everything works out”.

Contentment, giving, holiness and serving are all wonderful things and all Christians should be striving to improve at them. However, God is not a vending machine and those things are not coins. We don’t get to insert our goodness and have what we want appear.There isn’t an chart out there that lists the behaviors or states of perfection at the achievement of which God will automatically dispense what we want.

Rather than being a vending machine, God is a good father who gives good gifts. (see Matthew 7:9-11). He only gives us what will be for our good. Kids I know who have gotten pretty much everything they asked for from their parents have ended up pretty messed up. God is a better father than to let that happen to us. As is often the case with kids, we often get confused and a bit grumpy that we aren’t being given the really great seeming thing we’ve asked for. We can’t always see his perspective on what’s good. The things he gives us are also gifts. We can’t earn them or deserve them. Even if we could reach the unachievable standard of perfection we would only be mustering what would be an entirely reasonable response to a holy, loving and good God. Our salvation and any other good thing God chooses to give us are gracious, undeserved gifts.

It is usually insulting to try to pay someone for a gift they have given you. Instead of petty and fruitless attempts to earn stuff from God, we should be living a life of thankful worship to God. We trust him to give us what we need not because we deserve it for being holy but because he is our father seeking our good.

Book review: David Helm- One to one bible reading

One to One Bible Reading: a simple guide for every Christian
David Helm
Buy at Matthias media

In One to One Bible Reading, David Helm aims to equip Christians to fruitfully read the bible with another Christian or with an interested non-Christian.

It is quite a short book- the body of the book is less than 80 pages long so could be read in a sitting or two by most people. It is enough to get you started at successfully reading the bible with someone without getting unnecessarily bogged down in theory.

I appreciated the encouragement that any Christian is capable of doing this and the good advice on how to make time reading the bible with someone else fruitful. The advice takes the form of practical tips like how not to dominate the discussion or how to prepare for a meeting and of outlines for how to structure a study. They provide broad frameworks for approaching passages as well as questions that might be helpful in understanding each of the different biblical genres. I haven’t used the frameworks they suggest extensively in a one to one bible reading setting however they look solid and helpful. There is some useful photocopyable worksheets in the back of the book for one of the frameworks.

Even if reading the bible with one other person is not the approach you choose to take, there is still things to learn from this book. The advice about how to work through a biblical text is solid and would be useful in any form of group or personal bible study. I think I might start using some of the questions in my personal bible study.

I can attest that the ideas in this book work. The ministry I help lead has been encouraging one to one bible reading for some time. Earlier this year over the course of a few months I got together with someone to read some of the Old Testament minor prophets. I found that I learned a lot more by reading and discussing with someone else than I did by just reading on my own. Others in our ministry have been involved in fruitful bible reading partnerships with non-Christians. I’m really glad that the author has put together this book as it will make training more people to read the bible with others so much easier.

I will definitely be recommending that our ministry use this book. I’d likewise recommend it to any Christian who is interested in discipline other Christians or introducing non-Christian friends to what the bible has to say.


Review copy courtesy of Matthias Media.

3 years

Today marks 3 years of blogging here at Joanna Muses. I'm pleasantly surprised to have been able to keep it going for so long. Across those years there's been lots of posts and quite a few layout changes. Some of those layouts I look back on and wonder what I was thinking!

I'm really thankful for all of you who read this blog! It's encouraging that people I don't know (and some that I do), read what I write. I hope it is helpful to you.

Trusting God to be God

We Christians like to talk about trusting God a lot. Christians who are facing some uncertainty about the future are often told, “trust God” or some pretty similar variant of the idea. Applied rightly, it is good and biblical advice. However, I think it is often a bit more complicated than those deceptively simple words would make it sound. If the answer is “trust God”, I think we need to ask a second question. That question is, “Trust God to do and be what?”

I thought I was doing pretty well at the whole trusting God thing. I suppose I was doing well if the trust we are talking about was trusting God to be my heavenly personal assistant who does all the hard work of making sure things happen pretty much according to my plans! Although I wasn't thinking this way about every area, I realized for some things in life my trust in God was based on the assumption he was going to give me what I wanted.

Maybe God’s will and mine will match up on some things. I hope that happens! It is true that often God does give us the desires of our hearts (see Psalm 37:4). It isn’t bad to ask him for specific things that we need or want. (see Matthew 7:9-11 & Philippians 4:6) He’s our father and we can go to him about anything big or small.

But ultimately, our trust shouldn’t be that God will make life work out according to our plans. He isn’t our heavenly personal assistant. It is a pretty shallow form of trust that risks making what we are after our idol that we are using God to get. It sets us up for massive disappointment when it becomes evident that God’s will looks different to ours. It also sets us up for frustration when we see other people getting what was in the plan we had for ourselves!

Instead, we must trust God to be God and for his will to be done rather than ours. We must trust that God knows what he is doing infinitely more than we do. He is God and we are not! We must trust that even when things don’t play out according to our plans that God is working everything together for good (see Romans 8:28). We must be as willing to trust him when he hasn’t been giving us what we want as when he has.

I’m preaching to myself here. This has been a hard thing to learn. It is challenging to pray, “God, I really want ………….., but I trust that you are bigger and wiser than I am. Regardless of whether things turn out the way I wanted them, I trust that you are in control and that your will is good.” Placing things in his hands like that is scary sometimes, but he is worthy of that kind of trust.

Book review: Jared C. Wilson- Gospel Wakefulness

Gospel Wakefulness
Jared C. Wilson
Buy the book


In Gospel Wakefulness, Jared Wilson teaches on how the gospel should not just be something we intellectually acknowledge but something that should captivate us and stir us to passionately live in light of it.

I really liked this book. I’ve been in Christian settings where the gospel becomes something that gets you in the door of faith after which you move onto more “practical” aspects of Christian living. The book provides an excellent correction to this attitude. He argues that being awake to the magnificence and significance of the gospel will help us become more sanctified and help us love God more while preventing us from falling into hyper-spirituality or legalism where we feel we constantly must be proving ourselves to God.

I was also thankful to see sound and sensible advice about the differing ways living passionately in light of the gospel may look for those with different temperaments or experiencing depression as harm can sometimes be done by expecting everyone to fit a particular mould.

While there is some deep stuff in the book, it isn’t hard to read. Wilson is a compelling writer and uses a lot of testimonies and illustrations. My only critique is there possibly could have been a little more on how to pursue gospel wakefulness. However, that doesn’t detract from the excellent stuff that is there.

I doubt any of us are as captivated as we could or should be by the gospel so I think we could all benefit from this book.


Review copy courtesy of Netgalley and Crossway

Featured song: Ginny Owens- If you want me to

Quotable: Lukewarm

To be lukewarm is to live as if what you presently know and experience of Christ is enough. No need or desire to press in further. No need or desire to seek after God. Little or no longing to pray and fast. Little or no longing to break free of sin. Satisfied with the current depth of delight in the Spirit. Satisfied with the current extent of knowledge of the Father.

from To the One Who Conquers: 50 Daily Meditations on the Seven Letters of Revelation 2-3 by Sam Storms

When you don't know what to pray

Sometimes I know exactly what I want to pray. Sometimes I can present God with a thought through, detailed list of exactly what I am pretty sure I need from him.

But sometimes I can’t. Sometimes I just don’t know what to pray. Sometimes things are too painful or confounding to be put into orderly coherent prayers. Sometimes I don’t understand what is going on in myself or others well enough to know what to ask.

I’ve been finding myself in don’t know what to pray situations a bit lately. When that happens I’ve been taking great comfort in what Paul has to say in Romans 8:26-27

“Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”

I think there are two big encouragements here. One is that God is not distant from our problems. The spirit is interceding on our behalf! Pretty amazing to think that the members of the trinity are talking to each other about our problems! Another encouragement here is that whether we know and can coherently express what needs to be prayed for is not ultimately important. The spirit understands our hearts and the will of God even when we do not.

So when you pray, don’t panic that you do not know what to pray. Just pray however you are able and trust that God knows perfectly even when you express imperfectly. Trust that even when your prayers feel weak, the intercession of the spirit on your behalf is powerful.