Joseph Alleine and Praying for Salvation

Robert Elmer compiled a collection of Puritan prayers with contemporary English in his excellent book, Piercing Heaven, which I highly recommend for you to add to your bookshelf. In this collection is a section with prayers in regards to giving the gospel to others. One such prayer includes the 17th Century preacher Joseph Alleine:

"O Lord, how insufficient I am for this work. With what will I piece the scales of Leviathan - or make my heart, hard as a millstone, feel what you desire it to feel?

Will I go and speak to the grave, and expect the dead to obey me and come forth?

Will I make a speech to the rocks, or lecture the mountains, and move them with arguments?

Will I make the blind see?

From the beginning of the world no one has ever heard of opening the eyes of a person born blind. But, Lord, you can pierce the heart of a sinner.

I can draw the bow at random, but you direct the arrow between the cracks of the armor.

I come in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel. I come forth, like David against Goliath, to wrestle, not with flesh and blood, but with rulers and cosmic powers, and spiritual forces of evil of this world.

This day let the Lord defeat the Philistines, take away the armor of the strong man, and give me the captives out of his hand. 

Lord, choose my words. Choose my weapons for me. And when I put my hand into the bag, and take our a stone and sling it, and carry it to the mark, make it sink - not into the forehead, but into the heart of the unconverted sinner.

Take him to the ground like Saul of Tarsus.

Lord God, help! How can I leave them this way? If they will not hear me, still I pray that you will hear me. I pray that they might live in your sight! Lord, save them, or they perish.

My heart would melt to see their houses on fire when they were fast asleep in their beds. So is my soul moved within me to see them endlessly lost?

Lord, have compassion, and save them out of the burning. Put forth your divine power, and the work will be done.

Slay the sin, and save the soul of the sinner. Amen"

Mercy Killing

In a recent interview on the TV show "The View," actress Anne Hathaway said, "abortion can be another word for mercy." This is such a troubling, disturbing understanding of mercy killing of an unborn baby. How could abortion possibly be merciful? First, what is mercy?

In a discussion with a lawyer, Jesus defined a neighbor as the one who showed mercy to a beaten man along the road (Luke 10:25-37). Mercy is the kind treatment of someone to relieve their trouble. In Jesus' parable, a good Samaritan bound up the wounds and cared for a man beaten along a path and left for dead. The Samaritan man had compassion for this man, even paying for a stay in a hostel. 

Compassion did not lead to ending the beaten man's life for suffering, but to heal. Mercy is healing, treating someone else well to promote good, to help someone in need. Could Hathaway mean mercy to the baby is best shown in ending the baby's life rather than care for both the mother and the baby? What trouble is the baby suffering from which requires mercy? The three troubles I am able to think of are (1) the baby suffers from a potentially troubling life due to unloving parents, (2) the baby suffers from a disability, or (3) the parents cannot support the child.

Killing an unborn baby is not merciful because the baby is unwanted by unloving parents. This logic would be haunting if used by abusive parents of born babies. Furthermore, human beings with disabilities are not signs that life is punishment and killing them is merciful. Life is worth living even with difficulties. I have seen in Christ's church a people with compassionate hearts adopting babies whose mothers could not care for. There is mercy in Christ who shows mercy through His people. 

If you are reading this as a pregnant mother, I encourage you to connect with Pathway to Hope in Hamilton, Ohio. They have merciful resources to help with pregnancy, connecting with placing your baby up for adoption, help for fathers, and plenty more.

Mercy is also defined in the Scriptures as bearing with others, or forbearance. Timothy Lane and Paul David Tripp define biblical forbearance brilliantly: "Forbearance is patience under provocation. It is willing to stand alongside someone in trouble even though it makes life more difficult." 

A baby makes life more difficult for a mother. Mercy bears with a life with more challenges. To see an unborn baby's life as something to silence with the cruel hands of killing simply because life is about to get more challenging or the baby will have difficulties due to disability is not mercy, but merciless.

Hathaway continued, "Just because you get pregnant doesn't mean you get to keep that baby." Hathaway admits abortion ends the life of a baby. She calls the unborn what a common sense epistemology knows as obvious: that life is the life of a baby.

Abortion is the execution of human life with an unjust trial, judge, and executioner devised to silence the life of the unborn who is helpless, voiceless, and hidden inside a mother's womb which God meant to be a place of safety for a growing baby. To redefine mercy as a cruel, merciless act is to call something evil good (Isaiah 5:20). It is unjust to legalize the death of an unborn baby due to inconvenience and call it justice.

People are looking for justice and mercy in a place of execution. America's demand for legal killing of babies, now wed with calling it mercy, is a Satanic twisting of the only place human beings may find justice and mercy. Calvary was a place of execution, and we in our sin are the executioners. Yet, God sent Jesus into the world to save sinners. God will not justify our sin by redefining mercy and justice, but with real mercy and justice punished Christ instead of sinners.

Christ's death was not a killing to put Him out of His misery, but to free sinners from the misery of sin and death. Mercy in the heart of God matched with His might and authority to execute Christ to give life to those who believe in Him rather than to place the punishment on them. We are to turn away from our unjust ways and thinking and toward God who is just and merciful to those who believe in Jesus. 

There is mercy for sinners in Christ who suffered and died for sinners, including those guilty of abortion. If you have had an abortion and looking for mercy, or would like to know more about God's forgiveness and salvation in Christ Jesus, please email me. I would love to tell you about our Savior and to pray with you.

The Wise Person is Teachable

 “The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man listens to advice.” –Proverbs 12:15

The fool does not admit to wrongdoing in total. He is either right in his own eyes, or would be right if it weren’t for circumstances or other people, what we call blame-shifting.

I look back and reflect on how the Lord used me as a tool to help so many people. Redeeming rocky marriages, reconciling friendships in strife, comforting those who grieve, seeing sinners repent. However, I am in no ways perfect. I have said words that have wounded, stemming from wrong thoughts. I could easily defend my wrongdoing with a posture of being right in my own eyes, shifting blame on others saying “they made me angry” as opposed to confessing that I sinned in my anger.

God has a wise word: a wise man listens to advice. What remains foolish in me must humbly be open to council. In a word, the wise person is teachable; moving from self-righteousness toward humility. This requires my pride to gaze toward the cross. Christ laid down His life not only to forgive me, but to save me. Christ cleanses me with the water of His Word. Beloved, the Bible is a treasury of wisdom instructing our hearts to be transformed from our foolish thoughts and desires to know and desire God. Self-righteousness stands in the way of my knowing and desiring God.

Self-righteousness kills relationships. To a spouse or kids, self-righteousness makes living with you difficult because you cannot be wrong and they can never live up to your expectations. Being a close friend to you is difficult because any threat to your self-righteousness makes conversations with you unbearable. Words and behaviors must be defended or excused because you know you are right.

The Christian has received the gift of the Father in Christ a righteousness that is not his own. I am perfect in the eyes of God because I am in Christ. I no longer feel dread defending my foolishness because such things no longer condemn me. I have been liberated to listen to advice because now I am being sanctified.

Pride fears appearing weak, yet wisdom owns up to two things in our decision making and relationships: I miscalculate my own foolishness and blindness in my thoughts and I undervalue the wisdom I could receive from the counsel of others. God has made known to us the path of life (Psalm 16:11), a path our Savior tells us few find and is a hard path (Matthew 7:14).

A healthy Christian traveler on the hard path of life needs a church family pursuing wisdom as well as a humble ear inclined to learn from their advice. Christ’s disciples are lifelong learners of the depths of the hidden treasures of knowledge and wisdom in Christ (Colossians 2:3). Oh, how much more precious are the treasures of wisdom to be learned than rubies (Proverbs 8:11)! The great treasury of learning God’s revealed Word together with humble, teachable hearts in adoration of Christ in whom is hidden all the treasures, the valuable joyous rewards which delights the heart, of knowledge and wisdom.

Beloved flock, let us be easy listeners and truth speakers encouraging one another’s adoration for Christ as we pursue wisdom together in united harmony, not in pride but lowly, not wise in our own eyes (Romans 12:16).

Heavenly Father, You search the heart and know our foolishness. Yet, in Your wisdom You know what lessons must be heard and learned. Grant Your servants humble, teachable ears to hear godly advice. Grant us grace to recall our need and dependence on You. Grant us grace which stirs our hearts to pursue wisdom hidden in Christ by the deep study of Your Scripture. Bless Your church as we labor together as we teach one another in united adoration of Christ. In Jesus’ name. Amen.