March 13, 2013

• blogging to placard Jesus Christ ~ the highest felicity

   
  This week, one of my son's friends posted this greeting on his Facebook page:

  
  "Have a Felicitous Birthday!"

  "Felicitous" is not a word we hear used very often in this day and age... but as I read that, I was reminded me of some words from Susanna Anthony's (1726-1791) diary.
  

  June, 1752. O my God, my gracious God, is it so? My soul, my immortal soul, is it as I have this day heard? Are believers thus nearly united to Christ? Is it a vital, spiritual, indissoluble union; "I in them, and they in me?" My faith was even ready to stagger at this, as to my own part. I can hold it, in a general view of it; but when it is set out in such lively terms; the inestimable privileges resulting therefrom, and the surprising heights and depths of the condescending grace of God, to take worms of the dust thus near to his infinite Majesty, I am ready to say, all my hopes are vain ! It can never be so as to me. I can never be thus united to the great God-Man-Mediator, and derive so more life from him! Can l be thus closely united to an infinite Being, and yet feel so little strength and grace? Can I be united to the pure and holy God. and yet be thus unholy? Can l be in him, in whom dwells all the fulness of the Godhead, as the branches are in the vine, and bear so little fruit? O, methinks it is impossible! And yet in this is all my confidence, delight, desire and expectation. This makes life supportable and death desirable.

     O my Lord and head, am I thus united to thee: thou in me, and I in thee! I could never have dared to claim such a union with the Most High, hadst thou not revealed it. O happy privilege! the only desire or joy of my soul. The highest felicity of a rational being, as it is the foundation, whence flows all the happiness I enjoy, expect, or desire. O blessed union ! O dear privilege! All that is worthy the wish of a rational creature. Why was I born to he made thus happy? O blessed, for ever blessed be God, that I have a being among rational creatures, for this end! That I should be raised to this honor and dignity of being so nearly allied to the great, eternal, infinite God. Here be all my future contemplation and joy. Here be all my sense of pleasure. Here be all my sweet repose, and all my rest. Here be all the confidence of my soul; its only centre, and fixed abode. Here let me lose all the relish of creature delights: and with these, here let me lose concern to please a vain world. Let them think me mean, sordid, low-lived, and having no taste for refined pleasures: while my whole soul is divinely ravished, with the infinite glories of thy nature, and the felicity of being so nearly united to Jesus the dear Mediator, it is enough.
   
     Lord, here I would delight to dwell. It is long since I have voluntarily chosen to lay up all my good in thee. And I have never willingly retracted. Though, alas! I have too, too often seemed so to do; yet, O my God, my desire has been to thee, and to the remembrance of thy name. I trust my heart has never even secretly drawn back from its first choice of thee; but has a thousand, and ten thousand times renewed its first solemn engagements to be thine. And, if a hearty consent to the terms of the gospel, and a daily desire after, and delight in Christ, and after conformity to him, be an evidence of my union to him, l will still hope. Notwithstanding all my yet unallowed weakness, barrenness and sin, I am united to this God by faith; and shall be brought to glory. Here, O my soul, take thy shield, thy faith and confidence. Be fixed, and be no more afraid. Here rejoice and triumph. If indeed united to the great Redeemer, thou art happy, and shall be so, though heaven and earth pass away. As long as the eternal God is thy refuge, nothing but sin shall hurt thee. And that shall not have dominion over thee. O my only desirable refuge, save me from every inclination to sin.

  ~ Source: "The Life and Character of Miss Susanna Anthony. Who Died, in Newport, (R I.) June 23, 1791, in the 65th year of her age. Consisting Chiefly in Extracts from Her Writings, with Some Brief Observations on Them." Complied by Samuel Hopkins, Second Edition. (Portland, Maine: Lyman, Hall & Co. 1810), 96-98. (Underlining mine.) / HT for the text: http://books.google.com/books?output=text&id=YO0QAAAAYAAJ&jtp=9.

  I bring Miss Anthony's words to you today because I long for you and I plead with you to seek to enter into and share in that highest felicity, to prove by experience the doctrine David wrote and sung of in the Psalms:

  ... Happy is that people, whose God is the LORD (Psalm 144:15b).

  and . . .
  

  Blessed is the man whom thou choosest, and causest to approach unto thee, that he may dwell in thy courts: we shall be satisfied with the goodness of thy house, even of thy holy temple (Psalm 65:4).

  and . . .

  The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage... Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy presence is fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore (Psalm 16:6, 11).

  
  • Do words such as these characterize your daily Christian life (your actions and attitudes)?
  
  

  happy, blessed, satisfied, goodness, pleasantness, goodly, life, fulness of joy and pleasures for evermore?

  • Do you count knowing Christ . . .

  
  

  ... as a dear, happy, and inestimable privilege?

  ... the only desire of your soul?

  .... your highest felicity?
  

  Blogging "for your progress and joy of faith"

  What a great joy it would be for me to see you walking in the truth, so I might be able to exult along with the apostle John:

  
  I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth!
  

  There are several reasons why I blog, but one of those is "for your progress and joy of faith" (Philippians 1:25, ESV). Can anyone say we are making any genuine progress at all in our Christian pilgrimage if our lives are, for all intents and purposes, devoid of joy, and if our faith that does not increase in an experiential (or experimental) knowledge of that highest felicity which Susanna Anthony had begun to know and which David described? Jesus Himself told us that He came that we might have life and life more abundantly, that our joy might be full, and that streams of living water might flow out of our hearts as we come to Him and drink!

  In times of persecution and trial, the early Church rejoiced with joy unspeakable and full of glory (I Peter 1). The believers in Acts 5 rejoiced that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for Christ's name, and in Hebrews 10 we read that the believers rejoiced in God when their goods were plundered! In writing from prison, the apostle Paul charged us to rejoice in the Lord always. Always!
  
  Turn to Acts 8, and notice how the early Church behaved as she was scattered during persecution. These believers did NOT cry out and whine with a grumbling and complaining spirit, "Woe are we! Why us?" and engage in a fleshly, self-absorbed pity-party –– but rather they responded in the Spirit:

  "Woe are those souls who don't know Christ! And woe are we if we don't preach the Good News of Great Joy, the only way to this Highest Felicity to all the peoples –– no matter where God in His providence may send us! This is a God-ordained opportunity for testimony! Blessed are we who have been sent to this place to declare His glory even here, among the Samaritans, for we know God has a plan to gather a people for Himself out of all the peoples of the world for the sake of His name! O! that Almighty God might use our witness here to pluck more souls from the fire, just as we were plucked out by His grace! How will these souls call on Him, how will they believe on Him unless we testify of Him who is our exceeding Joy?"

  –– And so we find the saints in Acts 8 "scattered abroad" going "every where preaching the word..." with the result being this: "great joy in the city." This type of life of rejoicing is a part of what Martyn Lloyd-Jones called "the great and glorious possibilities of the Christian life." But O! how we have dumbed down those great and glorious possibilities and limited the Holy One of Israel –– and we have settled for earthly husks and fleeting shadows! How puny our expectations! Truly we are living in a day of small things because we are living in a day of small and diminished expectations! O! that our God might give us clearer views of Himself that our expectations might be heightened and made great, informed rightly by the Scripture!
  

  • How do you respond in times of trial and stress and disappointment? Have you known the supernatural joy of the Lord bubbling up from within and flowing out through the operation of the Holy Spirit sustaining you and imparting to you Habakkuk 3 joy?

  Getting into the temple!

  Having read Miss Anthony's diary, the Rev. Edward Dorr Griffin (1770-1837) became convicted of the profound deficiency in his own spiritual pilgrimage. Here was his response:

  Wednesday, Oct. 4 [1797]. In consequence of reading the prayers of Miss Anthony, and discovering her intense desire to obtain more clear and transforming views of God, I have been led to reflect on the great difference between her prayers and mine. I have been, for the most part, asking for particular exercises of divine power, to produce effects in regard to me, my friends, my people, and Zion at large. And in prayer my mind has been more on the desired effects, than on that fulness and glorious sufficiency of wisdom, power, goodness, majesty, condescension, patience, faithfulness and truth, which there is in God. Thus I have stopped at the threshold, without getting into the temple. Had I in prayer been more intent to gaze into God, and had I exercised myself more in adoration and praise, I believe my acquaintance with God would have been vastly greater, and my mind more transformed into his likeness. Let it in future be the burden of my prayer, "Lord, show me thy glory."
  
  ~ Source: "Memoir of the Rev. Edward D. Griffin, D.D., Compiled Chiefly from His Own Writings" by Edward D. Griffin & William Buell Sprague (New York: Taylor & Dodd, 1839), reprinted in 1987 by Banner of Truth Trust, 30. HT for the text: http://books.google.com/books?id=JbAEAAAAYAAJ).

  In short, if you are Christ's, I want you to get into the temple –– for that is our inheritance as children of God! The veil to the Most Holy Place has been torn from top to bottom! The way has been opened through the body and the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ! Through Him we have access! I want each and every day for each and every one of you who are Christ's to be a felicitous day! I don't want you to stop at the threshold without getting into the temple!

  And for you who may have doubts about this "Christian hedonism," know this:  our fervent pursuit of joy in Christ isn't merely for our own spiritual well-being... How can we really expect to be vibrant ambassadors of Jesus Christ taking the good news of great joy (highest felicity!) to all the nations, if we have not begun to experience and know for ourselves that highest felicity! How can we invite others to the Lord's banqueting house if we've never sat down in His shade with great delight, if we've never supped with our first Love to know His fruit sweet to our taste, if we've never been sustained and refreshed by His Holy Spirit, if we've never known His banner over us to be love by the Spirit's inner witness, if we've never known the felt comfort and strong assurance of His left hand supporting our head and His right hand embracing us, if we've never known God's lovingkindness to be better than wine, better than life? (See Song of Solomon 2:3-6). How can we with any integrity exhort the nations to sing to the LORD a new song if we have no new song to sing ourselves?

  Our pastor has been preaching through the book of Colossians, and I jotted down the following question in my bulletin this past Sunday morning:

  "What does it REALLY mean to be a 'partaker of the inheritance of the saints in the light'?"
  (see Colossians 1:12, NKJV)

  I think you'd have to agree with me that Miss Anthony and King David show us what it REALLY means to be a partaker of the inheritance of the saints in the light... But, sad to say, too many of us look around at the average 21st century Christian (or even the unbelieving world!), and we're tempted to think we're doing pretty well, aren't we? That's why in addition to exhorting you to read the Bible, I continue to encourage you to read good Christian biography!
  

  • Have you begun to enter into and enjoy that inheritance of which King David and Susanna Anthony partook? If not, would you pray for God to give you a clearer vision of Christ and a greater understanding of the inheritance that is yours as a blood-bought child of God?

  "NOT nice little moral or psychological pep talks" ... but "laboring to placard God"

  In his biographical message on Jonathan Edwards, "The Pastor as Theologian," John Piper said:
  

  "What our people need is not nice little moral or psychological pep talks about how to get along in the world. Most of our people have no one, have no one, who is laboring to placard God before their eyes. And so many them are starved, and they don't know why they're starved. They don't know what to ask for. They interview pastors for their churches and they don't know what questions to ask even. They don't know what's missing in their souls by and large. They need the infinite God, the God-entranced vision of Jonathan Edwards."

  "They are like people who have grown up in a room with an 8-foot flat white plaster ceiling and no windows. They have never seen the broad blue sky, or the sun blazing in midday glory, or the million stars of a clear country night or some trillion-ton mountain. And so they can't explain the sense of littleness and triviality and pettiness and insignificance in their souls. But it's because there is no grandeur. What our people need is the God-entranced vision of reality that Jonathan Edwards saw."

  ~ Source: http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/biographies/the-pastor-as-theologian. The first quote is from the audio recording, the second from the written transcript.

  Dr. Piper was addressing a group of pastors at the 1988 Bethlehem Conference for Pastors. I'm not a pastor, but know this:  I am not blogging here to give you nice little moral or psychological pep talks! Just over three years ago in this post, I wrote:

  I consider my writing here a stewardship for which I will be held to account one day. I'm a steward of God's Word...all His Word...nothing held back, no sugar coating...no shrinking back...
  
  

  

  I'm no Piper, and I'm no Edwards –– but I have the same heavenly Father, and the same Savior –– I've been bought with the same precious blood, and adopted into the same family of God, and have been given the gift of the same Holy Spirit –– and so I pray God would be pleased to honor and to use my efforts here to placard God before your eyes, that His Heavenly Dove might descend with fire upon those words I write which are true to Scripture, and infuse them in such a way that that the Breath of God might blow and shatter into smithereens that white plaster ceiling that blinds you to the all-surpassing Beauty and Glory and Goodness and Majesty of Christ –– to tear down and demolish any misunderstandings and misconceptions you have about Jesus Christ and the life and the inheritance He died and rose again to give you, so you might come to understand that God's prospering you means nothing less than God granting you the grace to call upon Him, to go to Him, and to pray to Him –– that you might seek Him and find Him as your all-surpassing and all-satisfying treasure as you search for Him with all your heart –– in other words, that God's prospering His people today in the 21st century means exactly the same thing that the LORD said to His people in Jeremiah 29, over 2,500 years ago:

  11  For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end. 12  Then shall ye call upon me, and ye shall go and pray unto me, and I will hearken unto you. 13  And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.
  

  I am praying that you would see that your soul's highest and greatest and happiest and most felicitous good is for you to draw near to God through Jesus Christ, and to know Him, and then, having known Him, pressing on to know Him more and more! That is the truest and highest and purest and choicest prosperity we can know! Remember that Jesus Christ was punished and died in our place to bring us back to God! I pray that God might grant you freedom from bondage to man-centered and self-absorbed notions of Christianity, and set you free as He opens your eyes to a truer, clearer, grander, higher, richer, and loftier spiritual sight of Him, so you might no longer trudge and plod along day after day undernourished and emaciated, but begin to recognize your soul's hunger and thirst, and hasten to run to Jesus Christ and eat and drink of Him, so you might be satisfied and happy with Him, and be filled with all the fulness of God! And then, having tasted and seen that highest felicity, hasten to run to all the ends of the earth with the good tidings of great felicity for all peoples! Know this:  Puddleglum Christianity will NOT turn the world upside-down!

  May God send out His light and His truth:  that they might lead you to that highest felicity ~ unto His holy hill, and to His tabernacles. That you might go unto the altar of God, unto God your exceeding joy:  yea, upon the harp may you praise Him, O God my God, O God your God, among all the nations for the sake of His name! (~ Psalm 43:3-4, adapted).

  For your joy and for His glory,
  Karen

  ---

  Related posts:

  more on Susanna Anthony:
  
  

  consider ... our ways, the great cloud of witnesses, Susanna Anthony,
  "... since thou hast been thus gracious ..." ~ Susanna Anthony and grace upon grace
  

  more on blogging:
  

  Why I blog and the only kind of recommendation I should seek
  Why I write and minister - My credo for being a godly encourager
  dedication 2010 (reflections on God's Word & God's grace) ~ no sugar coating...
  blogging to build up the ruined Church of God / expository exultation
  Here I stand & from here I cast (devoted to prayer & the ministry of the Word)
  five years ago ~ for your joy (AND an inheritance | Richard Sibbes & the Sealing of the Spirit)
  year end reflections, # 1: "end of the year ... in the midst of heartache" | Letter 97 on joy

  
  please see my series of posts on assurance & fighting for joy HERE

  other related posts:
  
  

  The Christian should not just believe the truth, and know it..." | the Father's assurance
  happiness & joy: the distinction that SHOULD be made | letter 155 on assurance & fighting for joy
  the 6th sola: "The Price of salvation is the Prize of salvation" ~ John Piper
  Lenten Reflections: Why did Jesus die? ACCESS! | Letter 140 on assurance & fighting for joy
  "I cannot consider myself to have been a believer (in the full sense of the word)"
  don't waste your new year ~ teach us, satisfy us, make us glad (Psalm 90:12-15)
  The Father's Inheritance (Eleven days' journey ~ A lamentation & an exhortation)
  Advent #1 WHY HAS JESUS COME? that we might have life & life more abundantly
  Advent # 9 WHY HAS JESUS COME? Adoption: the highest privilege the gospel offers ~ J.I. Packer
  Mistakes about Religion & What Religion Is ~ Henry Scougal
  "The duties of religion are delightful" ~ the fruit of "The Life of God in the Soul of Man"
  What is a nominal Christian?
  Phebe Bartlet – a child put in our midst ~ "Do you love Me?"
  year end reflections, # 2: rejoicing in "The Often Unwanted but Necessary Gift" | Letter 98 on joy ~ more on Jeremiah 29:11-13

  Scripture quotations unless otherwise indicated are taken from the King James Version of the Holy Bible. / Scripture quotations marked ESV are taken from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. Copyright ©2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. / Scripture quotations marked NKJV are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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