Anyways, I just watched an interview with John Piper and he brought up a phrase (which I’ve heard from him before in sermons and such). The phrase was: God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.

Can we glorify God if we are not satisfied in Him? Can we bring glory to God if we are not passionate about Him? Can we honor God if we are more concerned about things other than God? I doubt it.

If we’re more concerned about football than God, we glorify football, not God. If we’re more concerned about money than God, we glorify money, not God. If we’re more concerned about ourselves than God, we glorify ourselves, not God.

I strongly believe that unless we are satisfied in God and God alone, we do not honor or glorify Him to the extent that He has enabled us to. Unless He is our only priority, we steal glory from Him and waste it elsewhere.

During my Spring semester, I came back home from college every 2-4 weeks and gave a sermon on the Sunday of that weekend. I’ll admit that I cheated a little: I actually preached the sermons of my favorite preachers, not my own sermons. Paul Washer, John Piper, John MacArthur, Jeff Noblit… any of their sermons that I felt God wanted me to preach, I preached it.

I’m saying this because I think it’s time that I rise up to the occasion and truly seek God in this ministry. It’s a small ministry but I believe that it’s an important one. My past preparations for Sunday service was to listen to a sermon and write down key points and verses. Sometimes I would even copy huge chunks (70+%) of the sermon verbatim.

I think it’s time for me to mature a little bit more as a Christian and begin to find truths in Scripture on my own through the Holy Spirit rather than relying on the sermons of weak preachers who have been empowered by God.

Father God, I ask that You would speak Your great words through a small worm like me, that Your glory would shine upon us all and Your majesty would be seen and Your might proven. Let it all be for Your glory, Lord.

This will be the final blog move for a long time. I think the only reason I’d move blogs again is if I started paying for my own hosting so that I could host WordPress on my own rather than using the free WordPress hosting service (which is flexible but still limited).

Thanks for staying around!

I’ve been struggling greatly with sin and it has caused lots of doubt in my life. Paul writes in his second epistle to the Corinthians that if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old things have passed, the new things have come. I hear this so often that I started asking myself, “If you really are a new creature, why are you still committing these horrible acts of sin?” I began doubting my regeneration and salvation, which is a very dangerous thing to do. Doing that will only lead you to wallow in sorrow and despair, which distracts you from looking towards Christ and glorifying Him with your life.

I just read a chapter in Justification and Regeneration that dealt with these issues I have and it brought a smile to my face and joy to my heart.

Beloved Christian, sin’s days are numbered in your life! The ax has already been laid to the root of your sin. Like a tree that has been cut off at ground level, its leaves may still appear green for a while, but the fact is that its life is over. It is only a matter of time until every leaf withers and falls to the ground!

Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

These sins that I struggle with are just remnants of my old self. Though my flesh will still sin, it is not a representation of who I really am in Christ. Sin will attempt to reign over my body but if I walk with the Spirit, sin has no power over me. If you’re reading this and struggle with the same problems, I pray that God would enlighten you with the truth and bring peace to your soul. Seek His face and walk in His ways and His grace will shine upon you!

I think I’ll cover a lot more songs throughout the rest of the summer. Maybe I’ll even play a few of my original songs (none of which are complete) and put them up as well!

It was actually fun to see myself playing the guitar. There’s just something about hearing and seeing myself on video that makes me laugh and feel slightly embarrassed. I’ll keep recording videos of myself, though! Maybe someone will be blessed by one. Praise God!

Having come home from college, I can’t help but be locked up in my room all day. There’s really nothing for me to do around here. I live in the suburbs so anything that is remotely interesting is not within walking distance. I don’t have a car. My college friends don’t live near me. My youth group is still in school for another month. I’m left with nothing to do but whatever is available on my computer.

[Jesus said,] “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned. If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you. My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples.”

John 15:5-8

Based on how the past week or so went, this is both a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, I have a lot of time on my hands to spend in the Word, read Christian literature, play my guitar and practice my songwriting. On the other hand, the internet can be a source of procrastination, distraction and temptation. The logical thing to do would be to limit my internet time, and although that would help me immensely, it would also require a lot of discipline, which is something that I lack greatly in the midst of summer and boredom.

So there’s really nothing left for me except to pray for strength and grace to keep my priorities in order, to keep my focus where it should be, to make myself smaller and to make God’s glory everything. I want to be fruitful. I want to abide in Christ. I want to prove myself a faithful disciple of our Lord, bringing glory unto Him and Him alone.

Something that I haven’t mentioned before is the kindness of the Leiter family. I’m talking about Charles Leiter, author of Justification and Regeneration, and his wife, Mona. A few weeks ago, I had a random urge to check the inbox of an e-mail account that I had never used. Lo and behold, sitting in my otherwise empty inbox was an e-mail from Mr. Leiter!

We had a short discussion over the next few days and I asked him for some recommended Christian reading and he was kind enough to give me a huge list of books. I don’t know if I’ll ever finish reading all of the books on the list but I’ll definitely try!

The reason I’m writing this is that the Leiters offered to send me a free copy of their book as a gift. As a poor college student who doesn’t have many book resources for theology, I happily and joyfully accepted the offer. Since last weekend, I’ve been the excited owner of their book and I am learning a great deal from it.

Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. Now, all these things are from God…

2 Corinthians 5:17-18

Mr. Leiter explains the intricacies of the doctrines of justification and regeneration in such a way that anyone could understand. Although I’m only halfway through the book (just started the section on the doctrine of regeneration), I’ve already learned a great deal about these doctrines. I’ve heard many sermons that dealt with these issues and they taught me a lot but this book is precious to me for its content.

I highly, highly recommend this book for any and every Christian out there walking with the Lord.

If either of you happen to read this, thank you so much, Mr. Charles and Mona Leiter.

What I’ve come to realize is just how damaging or encouraging an environment could be. I didn’t really notice it while I was at college but the college environment, even though I try my best to avoid parties and ungodly activities, really has a creeping influence on the life of a believer. I read the Word less when I was there; I spent less time with my Father there; I started enjoying the things of the world more, such as video games and television shows and movies.

Now that I’m home, I’ve actually read my Bible a few times. I’ve actually talked with others believers and had genuine fellowship, talking about the things of Christ and the life of a Christian. Just the change in environment has had a positive influence on me.

God has opened my eyes and helped me to see the tremendous importance of Christ and His Word, our daily Bread. How can we profess to be spiritually alive if we do not eat the Bread of Life every day? Without it, we will starve. I pray that the Holy Spirit would guide me, and anyone who reads this, into spending time in the Word daily so that we would not starve.

I was laying awake in my bed last night at 2 in the morning. I couldn’t sleep and all I did was stir around in my bed, so I did what came to my mind naturally: ponder. I thought about God and His greatness and various lyrics began popping into my mind. In retrospect, I was thinking of lyrics because I wanted to write a song, but I was also saying a prayer of sorts to Him. A prayer of praise, awe and wonder.

It turns out that the lyrics are more poetry than song but that’s a fine line, isn’t it? I can always add a melody later and revise the lyrics if they need revising.

I was procrastinating studying for my final exams tomorrow by browsing YouTube for guitar-related videos. I happened upon an acoustic fingerpicker named Staffan Svahn and I listened to his song, “Red Hills”. As I listened, I read the description for the video:

Yesterday evening I took off late for my daily run. When I ran up into our valley the sun was setting behind me. As I gazed up towards the hills they caught fire. For about a minute the hills glowed in the most spectacular shades of red.

And as I read this description, the image that he witnessed burned into my mind. Rolling hills that glowed a fiery red against the backdrop of a marvelous, setting sun. Immediately, the thought pops into my head: “How great is the Lord?“

For possibly the first time in my life, I actually sat in awe and wonder at the magnitude of the God of Scripture and how beautiful His creation is. This was an exciting moment for me because I can’t recall myself ever being in true awe of the Lord even though I know with my mind that He is beyond comprehension.

Oh, how great is our God? Praise Him forever and ever.