Radical Womanhood

Finite Creatures and the Gift of Sleep

Sometimes I have a weird guilt trip at the end of the day. As the evening winds down, I realize I haven't written a blog post for the next day. I am tempted then to stay up to meet some self-imposed publishing deadline (which, sadly, I have actually done). Other times, I have to talk myself down and remind myself there's no need to sacrifice sleep for a voluntary activity. Reality check! The day is done. No one is going to die if a blog post isn't written. Go to sleep.

Scripture says sleep is God's gift to us (Psalm 127:2). But the temptation in our 24-hour culture is to ignore our creaturely limitations and try to live in a caffeine-fueled, sleep-deprived state. This is unwise for many reasons. Recent scientific research has shown the myriad benefits of getting at least seven hours of sleep, if not more. Our bodies need sleep, as do our minds. It's common knowledge that attempts at late-night conflict resolution are unwise--when we're weary, we lack clarity and self-control to resolve our disagreements. Now science is confirming that sleep-deprivation also affects moral judgments.

Sleep is one of those boundaries given to the finite creature from the all-sufficient, benevolent Creator. God has designed sleep to restore our health, bolster our learning, and process our memories. I think He has also given us sleep in order to rest and trust in Him as He works out the details of our lives. Lydia Brownback wrote about this when she addressed the flip-side of sleep-deprivation--anxiety-driven insomnia.

But if God is the one who makes us dwell in safety, what are lying awake worrying about? Maybe we are worried that God's idea of safety differs from ours. We have our agenda, and we often are pretty set on how things should all work out, and, of course, there are no guarantees that life is going to go our way when we get up in the morning. Or could it be that we have too much to do because we are taking on more than God has called us to carry? He has given us six days each week in which to labor; doesn't it stand to reason that a good God won't give us ten days' worth to accomplish in those six days?

There are some seasons of life in which sleeplessness may be an unavoidable factor for women, times such as caring for a newborn or for a family member with a critical illness. I believe God will supply sustaining grace for those needs. But when we lose sleep in order to strike something off our To Do lists or to entertain anxiety (I'm preaching to myself now, too!), we're ignoring a fundamental truth: we're finite and we're never going to get everything done on our agendas. Only God will accomplish all that He has declared will come to pass. This is the province of an infinite, all-knowing, all-sufficient Being. That should humble us and encourage us at the same time, for this is also the One who lovingly watches over us as we sleep (Psalm 4:8).

Sweet dreams!

Disciplined for Godliness

It's time for one of my favorite ministries again! The fourth single women's discipleship course kicked off this month. Our first meeting was a time to hear everyone's testimonies and our second meeting was about the priority of the Gospel.

This coming week, we will be discussing the spiritual disciplines. One of our assignments is to read a chapter by Donald Whitney titled, "Pursuing a Passion for God Through Spiritual Disciplines," which was published in A God-Entranced Vision of All Things: The Legacy of Jonathan Edwards. As I read, I found a few of the points Whitney makes to be very helpful in both cultivating faithfulness and avoiding legalism:

A spiritual discipline is is something you do, not something you are. Disciplines should not be confused with graces, character qualities, or the fruit of the Spirit. Prayer, for example, is a spiritual discipline, while joy, strictly speaking, is not. As practices, the spiritual disciplines are first about doing, then about being. The spiritual disciplines are right doing that leads to right being. That is, the purpose of doing the practices known as spiritual disciplines is the state of being described in 1 Timothy 4:7 as "godliness." Thus the discipline of prayer, rightly practiced, should result in godly joy. So while they should not be separated from each other, it is important to distinguish the practices known as the spiritual disciplines from the fruit that should result from them. . . . A person is not automatically godly just because he or she practices the spiritual disciplines. This was the error of the Pharisees, for although they prayed, memorized Scripture, fasted, and practiced other disciplines, Jesus pointed to them as the epitome of ungodliness. Godliness is the result of God's Spirit changing us into Christlikeness through the means of the disciplines. Apart from faith and the right motives when practicing them, the disciplines can be dead works.

Typically at this point in the course, we begin to track our personal devotions in order to be accountable to one another. The goal is not to have bragging rights nor is it to shame anyone who is wrestling with consistency. Rather, it is to be transparent with each other about how we are practicing the spiritual disciplines on a daily basis--a vital component of any discipleship program.

As I began to track my own devotions, I realized I had not had a personal retreat in quite some time. It's been an incredibly hectic year and I hadn't taken any extended time in months. Fortunately, a good friend who was leaving town for Thanksgiving offered the use of her home for my retreat. The day after Thanksgiving, I fled all the chores at my house for 12 hours of leisurely Bible study, journaling, prayer, reading, and--of course--a short nap. What I particularly enjoy about personal retreats is that I have the time to reflect upon recent events in my journal, to read prior entries, and to rejoice in the myriad ways the Lord answers prayer. It fuels my faith to then pray further for my friends, family, church, colleagues, and so on. And hopefully, it is accomplishing what Donald Whitney writes: right doing that leads to right being.

Bible Study and Personal Devotions

(Though I can no longer moderate and publish comments, I periodically want to address some of the questions I receive--one of the original purposes of this blog. So here's a recent email I received...)

Question: I have wanted to ask you if you’ve addressed on your blog the topic of Bible studies in your devotions. Have I just missed it? I have read the Bible through several times over the years and try to stay up with what my church is going through. I’ve also done the ‘Psalm a day’ study. Aside from those, though, what is a good ‘topical’ study? Does that make sense? How do you decide what to read from month to month?

Answer: You've asked a good question--and a timely one, too, because this month we start another nine-month single women's discipleship course at my church. One of the components of this course is quiet-time accountability. We will be keeping track of our personal devotions and sharing those developments with the group each week. Even though I'll be leading one of the groups, I need this accountability like everybody else. We live in a busy, busy world and it's a constant battle to not only have personal devotions, but to have effective and fruitful ones.

During one of our meetings, I typically bring in a number of Bible study resources and we talk about what each one is geared to do. I usually have a Bible dictionary, a commentary on a book of the Bible, a cultural commentary, a study Bible, a concordance, and a lexicon. I'll then show how each can help us understand a particular passage.

I enjoy studying Scripture with these tools in my personal devotions. I just finished going through Acts and Romans, for example, and primarily I was using a study Bible and Mark Dever's Promises Kept: The Message of the New Testament. When I hit difficult passages, I also pulled out other commentaries.

My personal devotions can include a number of practices. When I'm feeling particularly unfocused, I often go on prayer walks to get my blood stirring and my brain in gear. I sometimes sing worship songs along with my iPod. But most of the time, I study specific Scriptures and then read further in another book that's usually geared toward personal application. I just finished David Powlison's Speaking Truth in Love, which is about the practice of biblical counseling, and now I'm going through Charles Spurgeon's The Triumph of Faith in a Believer's Life. I also keep a journal. My journal is a chaotic mix of confessions, prayers, personal application, and insights from Bible study.

That said, I don't want to point to my own practices as being sufficient because I need to grow, as well. So I want to recommend an outstanding message from the New Attitude conference by Mike Bullmore. It is titled "Feeding on God: Cultivating a Fruitful Life in the Word." You can download the MP3 and the outline from the Sovereign Grace Store. I can guarantee you it's the best $2 you will spend in a long time! You may also want to read other posts on this topic in the Spiritual Disciplines category.

MacArthur on Bible Study

The MacArthur Study Bible was one of the many books given out to pastors at the Together for the Gospel conference. Being the servant I am, I was able to relieve the workers of one of the damaged copies. After all, it wouldn't be seemly to give away a damaged copy, right?! But we "bottom feeders" at any event are always happy to live at the lowest rung of the food chain and catch whatever crumbs we can. And this was a mighty big crumb! Thank you, Grace Books International!

This is the newly released second edition, a New American Standard Bible translation packed full of study notes and comments from Dr. MacArthur. This week, I've been reading through the book of Acts. I have gleaned so much from the study notes, even though we would have some differences in doctrine. I respect how Dr. MacArthur has studied to arrive at his cessationist position, while my pastors and I are continuationists with respect to the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, that pops up only occasionally in the comments and it is useful for me to read them to better understand his position. (However, as I understand it, we all agree on the doctrines of grace.) With that said, I heartily recommend supplementing your personal study with a Bible such as this one. A great example of the value of his commentary would be the note on Acts 13:29-30. Dr. MacArthur writes, "The OT predicted the crucifixion of Christ on a cross (Ps 22; Dt 21) at a time when this particular form of execution was not used. His burial in a 'tomb' was also prophesied (Is 53:9), yet victims of crucifixions were commonly tossed into mass graves." What a priceless nugget!

This Bible starts with a number of supplements, including an apologetic for the authenticity of the Bible and its preservation over time. If you are not familiar with the science of textual criticism, you may find this article on "How We Got the Bible" to be quite illuminating. There is also an article on "How to Study the Bible." I'd like to share with you one segment about reading the Bible. Dr. MacArthur writes:

Develop a plan on how you will approach reading through the Bible. Unlike most books, you will probably not read it straight through from cover to cover. There are many good Bible reading plans available, but here is one that I have found helpful.

Read through the Old Testament at least once a year. As you read, note in the margins any truths you particularly want to remember, and write down separately anything you do not immediately understand. Often as you read you will find that many questions are answered by the text itself. The questions to which you cannot find answers become the starting points for more in-depth study using commentaries or other reference tools.

Follow a different plan for reading the New Testament. Read one book at a time repetitiously for a month or more. This will help you to retain what is in the New Testament and not always have to depend on a concordance to find things.

If you want to try this, begin with a short book, such as 1 John, and read it through in one sitting every day for 30 days. At the end of that time, you will know what is in the book. Write on index cards the major theme of each chapter. By referring to the cards as you do your daily reading, you will begin to remember the content of each chapter. In fact, you will develop a visual perception of the book in your mind.

I trust even this bit of information will serve you as you study God's Word! You can check out the Bible, linked at right.

(Photo of John MacArthur at the Together for the Gospel conference courtesy of Sola Lumina Captura.)

How to End Well

January is coming to a close, which typically means our big resolutions for change have sputtered to a stop, too. For most of us, New Year's resolve is too flimsy. What we need is a big view of a big God to continue pressing in for change and growth. So that's why I'm posting this week's sermon notes from Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington, D.C. The sermon's title was "How to End Well: Prioritize." It was given by assistant pastor Thabiti Anyabwile, based on Haggai 1:5-6. "Now, therefore, thus says the LORD of hosts: Consider your ways. You have sown much, and harvested little. You eat, but you never have enough; you drink, but you never have your fill. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm. And he who earns wages does so to put them into a bag with holes."

I also want to highlight the soul-searching questions included at the end. If you decide to use them in your own devotions, I would highly recommend journaling your answers and prayers for change because I'm certain that within the year you will be surprised to see how the Lord has worked in some areas.

Finally, I want to gently spur on the woman reading this who is discouraged and feeling overwhelmed by apathy. It may be that there is a loving diagnosis in this sermon--the kind of hard truth that is truly releasing. As Thabiti Anyabwile says, "Emptiness and vanity do not happen by accident; they are byproducts of our deliberate choice to undermine God’s role in our lives. God cares more about the focus of our lives than the trappings of our lives. God instructs the Israelites to rebuild the temple so He will be glorified. The emptiness of our lives is not random chance. God will oppose our vain pursuits until we turn to Him. This is blessed evidence of His willingness to pursue us."

May God be our greatest treasure this year! Now for the sermon notes...

We’re now getting around the time of year when we get a glimpse of whether or not our New Year’s resolutions will be successful. Resolutions are sometimes funny, oftentimes serious, and they are almost always much easier to make than they are to actually follow through on. Such resolutions reveal our aspirations, our priorities, and our hope for what we want our lives to be. Resolutions often show that we are more preoccupied with ourselves than with God, other people, or eternal matters.

Haggai presents a good example of a people who start out with good intentions but drift. The account presented in this book leads us to three serious questions about our resolutions:

1. Where does God rank in our list of priorities and resolutions?

This passage is set in 520 BC, which was a momentous time for the Israelites. God was speaking to them through a prophet for the first time since they returned from the Babylonian exile. God had opened the ears of His people to hear His word and urged them to fulfill their promises to Him.

The exiles had returned for the express purpose of rebuilding the temple, and they had started out well on this path. They built an altar, observed the feasts, and seemed to seek the Lord. They even got so far as to lay the foundation of the temple. However, they were distracted. The people started focusing on their own creature comforts. Their leaders grew weary when opposition to rebuilding the temple arose, so they became complacent. So while the House of the Lord, which was to reflect His glory and be a venue used to display the atonement for sin, was in shambles, the Israelites pursued their own material gain.

The Israelites had come from exile with a purpose, but were diverted. In fact, it seems they had completely inverted their priorities. We learn several important lessons from this:

· Wrong priorities tend toward excess. The Israelites hadn’t just built houses for themselves, but they were fancy and excessive. Make it a regular habit to ask those close to you where you tend to be excessive, be it in a material or emotional sphere.

· Wrong priorities tend toward idolatry. We cannot put off or make excuses when God has commanded us to do something. Jesus said, "take up your cross and follow Me." We cannot replace God’s agenda with our own. We excuse our failure to obey God by saying "not yet." What pride to say that we know the correct timetable! Where have you said "no" to God? What has God told you to do that you have left undone?

· Wrong priorities lead to cowardice. The two leaders in this text (and the Israelites) caved into the pressures and difficulties they faced, placing the fear of man over the fear of God. Courage takes work, courage breeds change. Pray that you will have an "unavoidable impatience" for doing the work of the Lord.

· Wrong priorities affect how we relate to God. When is it ever justified to forsake worshiping God, to not honor Him by doing His will? Are we really interested in living in God’s presence and having His priorities?

2. Is there compelling evidence that God comes first in our lives?

Haggai charges the people to "give careful thought to your ways." He also observed that they have "planted much but harvested little" their lack of satisfaction is evidence against them! Their labor was empty and vain because their priorities were wrong. There are few greater pains than those of a life marked by missed opportunities. Israel’s pain is common to all those who do not have God as their highest priority.

Emptiness and vanity do not happen by accident; they are byproducts of our deliberate choice to undermine God’s role in our lives. God cares more about the focus of our lives than the trappings of our lives. God instructs the Israelites to rebuild the temple so He will be glorified. The emptiness of our lives is not random chance God will oppose our vain pursuits until we turn to Him. This is blessed evidence of His willingness to pursue us.

3. What do we need to do if we discover that God is not our priority?

God’s word to His people in Haggai is the same for us today: "I am with you." If we have wrongly ordered our priorities, repent. Turn to God in submission. Repentance is more than feeling sorry; it is a deep contrition, and attitudinal change of the heart and life, not only of the lips. Obey the will of the Lord.

Verses 8-15 present a path we can emulate whenever we find our priorities out of whack. Praise God for His willingness to oppose us when we are wrong! Jesus Himself is the One who finally and completely brings God the Father the honor and praise He deserves. "I am with you" is the essence of Biblical religion. What a gorgeous, complete, and irreplaceable truth! God desires a relationship with his people that is the point of redemption. When the Word became flesh, He promised all those who followed Him that He would be with them, even to the very end of the age.

What are some resolutions for making God first? These are some good questions to ask.

1. What command has God given me that I have left undone?
2. What single thing can I make plans for that will matter most in ten years and in eternity?
3. How can I do this year to increase my enjoyment of God?
4. What great risk will I take specifically and intentionally for God's honor and praise?
5. What is the most helpful new way I can strengthen my church?
6. For whose salvation will I pray most fervently?
7. What can I do to enrich my prayer life?
8. How can I use my finances to please and honor God?
9. What must I do to leave an enriched spiritual legacy to the next generation?
10. To what ministry will I devote an unprecedented amount of time?
11. What one doctrine do I want to better understand in order to know God better?

To finish well we must start with the right priorities and it’s never too late to make God your priority.

The Battle for Being In the Word

Q: So many Christians seem to be convinced of the power of the word of God. As an evangelical, I completely agree. But I seem to be missing the thirst that others (like you) seem to have to be soaked in the Scriptures. I just find it so hard to discipline myself to read the Bible, and even if I do have a quiet times, my motive is normally because it's something that good Christians should do, not because of a genuine desire to know God in the word. How I need grace! Have you ever experienced this? How can I be changed?

A: What a wonderful question! I appreciate your candor in asking this question, because I believe this can be a common situation for Christians. In fact, I would say it is a battle and for this specific reason: If we are truly regenerated and born again by the power of the Holy Spirit, then our spiritual Enemy cannot ever touch our salvation. We are secured by the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ and His finished work on the Cross. But our spiritual Enemy does work hard to make us fruitless in our witness and walk. This is why our daily devotions are so important. They express our dependency upon God and strengthen us for the battle against Satan, our indwelling sin, and our flesh and all its idolatrous desires.

I think this is where we have to start. (And I do mean "we"--each Christian faces daily distractions and can even experience seasons of dryness in personal devotions. We can't rely on experience or emotion to keep us faithful.) If we don't recognize that we are in a spiritual battle, we will walk out the door each day unarmed. If we don't recognize how completely unprepared we are, we will attempt to live in our own strength. Both are futile. So it is an act of humility to start each day by asking God to reveal Himself to us as we read His word. In doing so, we are saying we need to be equipped for the daily battle and we need His grace to glorify Him.

I used to just pick up my Bible and start reading. Now I endeavor to pray before I start, asking God to protect my distracted mind, to shore up my feeble and often sleepy eyes, and to give me fresh insight from His Word. I also try to read with a purpose. I am currently reading through Corinthians with a commentary by D.A. Carson. I find that supplementing my Bible study with commentaries is tremendously helpful. I also mix up the spiritual disciplines by practicing personal worship (singing along to worship songs on my iPod), praying with prayer partners or going on prayer walks, fasting, retreating, and accountability and confession. These practices enhance my personal devotions.

I've mentioned before on this blog the single women's discipleship group that I participate in. In this group, we are accountable to each other for our quiet times. We are to write down each day what we've done and share that information with each other at the start of our meetings. We're not doing that to compare ourselves to each other, but to help each other in the common struggle. We can't expect to mature as Christians without this practice. Plus, it's can be a wonderfully motivating tool to know we will have to account for how we've spent the time that God has given us!

The most important thing to remember is that we don't have personal devotions because "that's what good Christians do." We have them because as children of God, we have the immense privilege of sitting before the feet of the Lord of the universe and hearing Him speak through His Word. The goal is to see it as a pleasure not a duty.

Finally, I can recommend some good resources to help "jump-start" your devotions. The first is a book published by Sovereign Grace Ministries titled Disciplines for Life. You can download the PDF files from our website, or purchase the book on our store. This will give you a good overview on why the spiritual discplines are so necessary to cultivate. Then there are a number of practical study resources. I like D. A. Carson's For the Love of God (volumes I & II) because he presents a daily reading plan and a short commentary on one or more of those passages. Charles Spurgeons' Morning and Evening is another good supplement. Though it is not based on a daily reading plan that gets you through the Bible in a year (as Carson's book does), it is still a wealth of wisdom on particular verses or passages.

I hope some of these suggestions will prove to be helpful to you. I would also encourage you to cultivate an accountability partner. Perhaps you could ask a more mature woman in your church to help you, which could be done in a variety of ways. She could call you each morning to encourage you to be in the Word, she could ask you each week how you're doing, she could go through a study with you and meet periodically to discuss it and pray with you--whatever works best for the two of you. Don't forget, we aren't alone, even as single women! God has put us in His Body and so there are people all around us that can be used by God to help us grow. Sometimes we just have to ask. And thank you for asking on here!

Happy New Year!

Happy new year to everyone. I trust you all enjoyed worshiping the Lord on the first day of 2006. I was able to do so twice. Some friends and I rang in the new year by toasting each other with sparkling cider and then assembling in the living room to sing worship songs for about a half-hour. I love those intimate worship moments with a small group. We were fortunate to have a good guitarist and djembe drummer among us, which made everything sound just a little bit better. After worshiping the Lord in song, we then worshiped in prayer. I can't think of a better way to spend the first hour of the new year.

Later this morning, I went to church and during the service my pastor, Joshua Harris, challenged us to think about what resolutions we can make to grow in godliness. It's typical for most people to make resolutions to lose weight, change a bad habit, look for a new job, get out of debt--and so forth. But if we are want to become more Christlike, we have to have a plan for the spiritual disciplines that will help us grow.

Tomorrow I won't be blogging because I'm taking a personal retreat to fast and pray for this new year. Prayer and fasting is one spiritual discipline that I would like to make a more regular practice in my life this year. I'm going to pack up a number of commentaries, my journals from this year and last, and my study Bible and head to a house that a kind friend is lending me for the day. Free from distraction, I hope to hear from the Lord about His priorities for me in this new year. I will also look back at what I wrote about last year--the items I was praying about at the time, the areas I wanted to grow in, the Scriptures God was highlighting to me. I've been doing this yearly review ever since I became a Christian and it always inspires me to stop and worship the Lord for His faithfulness to me from one year to the next. Sometimes you have to take this 25,000-foot altitude review of your life to see how the Lord's direction and guidance have been taking shape over months and years. He is always at work, but sometimes the sea-changes are so subtle that you have to take the long view to spot them.

Again, happy new year! May the Lord be your greatest treasure this year!