Summer in the Psalms, Grace Gems and Tinker’s That Hideous Strength

Our apologies for not being able to put up this past Sunday’s sermon—we had some technical difficulty and appreciate you bearing with us! Lord willing this Sunday, June 5 we' start up again with our “Summer in the Psalms” sermon series. I say “again” because we did this last summer as well. Full disclosure a brother-pastor friend of mine who I have known since college (Neil) is the one—along with his local church family in Denver, Colorado that I first heard of this idea from—it is not original to me. Last summer in the first 13 Psalms was a great blessing and by God’s grace this summer will be as we study the Psalms together and learn about our great and worthy Lord! Join me in praying: that God is greatly glorified; that Christ our Savior is treasured more deeply; that our faith in the promises and character of our worthy Lord grows; that our gospel obedience/fruitfulness increases; that any without hope and Christ might find in the Lord Jesus Christ refuge repenting of their sin and trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ alone for salvation! SDG.

A few other resources and encouraging quotes to encourage you with this weekend:

Grace Gems is a wonderful website that I am confident will edify you as it has me and countless others. You can quickly and freely subscribe to get their biblical encouragement drawn from saints of old in your email by clicking here.

Here is a quote from Thomas Charles (1838) published by Grace Gems:

“God is as glorious in punishing sin—as He is in pardoning sin. Never did God appear more glorious, than when He was pouring out His wrath on the Son of His love, for our sins. Justice and mercy, holiness and love—there shone with united and transcendent splendor.”

About five years ago, Melvin Tinker wrote That Hideous Strength: How the West Was Lost. The subtitle of Tinker’s excellent book is “The Cancer of Cultural Marxism in the Church, the World and the Gospel of Change. In his very perceptive and mercifully short book Tinker provides a wonderful analysis of the situation we face in the West. Tinker quotes theologian Oliver O’Donovan who helpfully wrote:

“One can express the Christian perspective like this: the either-or of biological maleness and femaleness to which the human race is bound is not a meaningless or oppressive condition of nature; it is a good gift of God, because it gives rise to possibilities of relationship in which the polarities of masculine and feminine,more subtly nuanced than the biological differentiation, can play a decisive part.” (pages 84-85)

And Tinker also quoted Os Guinness who wrote:

“Let it be clearly understood that our hope in the possibility of renewal is squarely grounded, not in ourselves, not in history and not the fact that it has happened before, but in the power of God demonstrated by the truth of the resurrection of Jesus ... This is therefore, no time to hang our heads or hide our lights under any bushel for fear that we may be picked on for our refusal to fit in. We are to have no fear. We are to look up. We are to take strength from the fact that we can, because he can.” [pages 92-93]

Jesus answered him [Pilate], “You would have no authority over Me at all, if it had not been given to you from above…” (John 19:11)

And looking at them Jesus said to them, “With people this [salvation of a prideful wealthy person] is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (Matthew 19:26)

Amen and Amen! I highly recommend buying and reading this book (we should have extra copies on our book stand soon).

What the Lord says is good and what He has planned for us is good. Let us never despair and realize that our labor in and for the resurrected Lord and sovereign King of kings is never ever in vain (1 Corinthians 15:58)! Press on without fear and with great confidence in the Lord beloved blood brothers and sisters in Christ!

Soli Deo Gloria