In this past week's reading in Ezekiel, we saw the devastating fallout from Israel forgetting God and forsaking him for gods who would allow them to pursue their own selfish desires.

Its leaders were murderous and unjust. Rejection of authority and disrespect were rampant. The helpless and the poor were neglected and despised. God's people neglected his worship and his good commands. Sexual immorality and perversion of every kind abounded in the name of the worship of false gods. They even sacrificed their children to false gods, the equivalent to getting an abortion today on the altar of self-preservation or convenience.

In chapter 21, God tells Ezekiel to prophesy against the wickedness of his people and to groan and wail and weep over their sin and over the impending judgment of God. God himself would come to exalt that which was low and bring low that which was exalted. He would judge the false prophets who were prophesying peace, when there was no peace.

In the midst of his judgment, God was looking for someone who would stand in the breach and intercede for the land so that he might not destroy it.

In the midst of the evils all around us, and in the midst of wickedness even among the church as a national level, will God find us, willing to weep and groan over sin? Willing to stand in the breach and to intercede for those around us?

If we’re willing, where can we start?

We saw on Sunday that our holy God must judge sin, but that in His grace, He sent His Son into the world to bear our iniquity and to suffer the judgment for our sin in our place.

God is offering abundant pardon for sin through Christ to all who call on his name for salvation (Isa. 55:7; Rom. 10:13). Whoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal life! (John 3:16). Indeed, “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him” (John 3:36).

And how will our family and friends, our co-workers and neighbors, believe in him without us telling them of the good news? Even if you prophesy and speak the life-giving gospel of Christ to them, can you bring their dry bones to life?

We must pray and intercede for them, asking God to prepare their hearts for your invitation to Christ and/or for your invitation to join you at church.

Without God’s gracious enabling, they will remain hardened to him and to the gospel. They will be disinterested at best and hostile at worst. But who knows what God will do as you set your heart to pray and intercede and stand in the breach?

He loves to come with regenerating power, bestowing his salvation and riches on those who call on his name. We cannot raise the dead to life, but it is easy for him. Let’s not be guilty of not seeing our families and friends come to life or respond to our invitation because we’re not asking (James 4:2).

Here’s a poem based on God’s word to Ezekiel in chapters 21-22, meant to serve our meditation and stir our intercession.

Stand in the Breach
Weep and wail, your God to reach.
He looks for a man to stand in the breach. 
They’ve profaned his name, for his people plead -
With Christ our Savior, I N T E R C E D E.

With prayer + joy,

Ben

In the midst of unstable and wearying days, the world needs a steadfast church. A church that’s not easily moved from its doctrinal moorings, but one that’s rooted and enriched with the word of the gospel (Eph. 4:11-15; Col. 3:16).

It’s not the buzzword of the ‘gospel’ that strengthens and emboldens, but the actual message of Christ crucified, risen, and reigning that will inflame your heart and steel your resolve (Ezekiel 3:8-9).

As my friend Stephen Witmer pointed out on a recent STS podcast episode, the Corinthian church had a lot of problems that pressed for practical solutions. But before Paul addressed those, he made a beeline for the gospel. All of their needed changes had to be rooted in the redemptive work of the crucified Christ and the power of the risen Christ.

Even so, church family, we must remain steadfast in meditating on Christ and his redemptive work - in studying the wonderful works of God (Psalm 119:27). In rooting ourselves there, we’re not avoiding more practical considerations. It’s because we are so needy and have so many practical considerations that we must pull from Paul’s inspired playbook and begin our days in Scripture meditation and prayer.

We need solutions. We need strength. We desperately need a move of God. And so we meditate in the gospel and think together of how to go from there into every nook and need of our everyday lives. And I pray that the result would be an immovable steadfastness and abundantly fruitful ministry for the glory of Christ in our lives and all over our town.

With prayer + joy,

Ben

We read of the astonishingly wicked trade of God’s people, giving up the Fountain of Living Water for broken cisterns that could never satisfy (Jeremiah 2:12-13).

Just over a week ago, in reading Jeremiah 38, I was arrested by the idea that Jeremiah was thrown into a muddy cistern for the crime of boldly proclaiming God’s Word to his people. What was once a pool for purification was, by disuse and neglect, now drained of its cleansing power. It had itself become like the broken cisterns Judah looked to for joy and life instead of God.

But even in the midst of the people’s wickedness, God promised to save a remnant. Though his people suffered a figurative death in their captivity, he would raise them from that grave and bring them again into the land of promise.

Like Joseph before him, Jeremiah was drawn from the pit in a way that prefigured the resurrection of the true Prophet of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. God would still send him through the remnant he would bring to life.

Because of his hope in the God who raises the dead, Jeremiah could proclaim God’s Word with boldness, even as he wept over the people's wickedness and God's judgment on those who would not repent (Jeremiah 9:1, 10). He could take risks by the order of God, because ultimately there’s no risk if God is “guarding you through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Peter 1:5). The suffering in this life - including going to Christ and bearing his reproach or suffering shame for his name - they are for a little while (1 Peter 1:6-7; Hebrews 13:13).

May the Lord use this meditation on this passage to stir your heart to fresh faithfulness to the Word of God, away from the broken cisterns of the world and among those who would seek to quiet your witness to Christ and his gospel.

The Prophet’s Prison

Shattered cisterns the unchaste chase,
Till cleansing waters go to waste.
Purifying pool made a mire,
Now a prison for prophet fire.

Will you into the depths descend?
Go outside the gate to him?

Faith looked in the weeper’s well,
It beckoned up with grace to tell.
From the dark, faith reassurance gave:
God draws his servants from the grave.

With prayer + joy,

Ben

In recent reading in Jeremiah (through our 2-year reading plan), we’ve seen the faithfulness of God and his mercy on stunning display.

The people of Israel had “not obeyed God’s voice or walked in his law … doing nothing but evil in [God’s] sight from their youth,” provoking him to anger (Jeremiah 32:23,30).

And yet God promised to bring a remnant back and to make a New Covenant with them. Consider these promises that God made to Israel, even after they had worshiped other gods and even sacrificed their children in worship of false gods (32:35):

“I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you. Again I will build you, and you shall be built!” (31:3-4)

“They shall be radiant over the goodness of the Lord … their life shall be like a watered garden” (31:12).

“I will satisfy the weary soul, and every languishing soul I will replenish” (31:25).

“I will write my law on their hearts. I will be their God and they shall be my people ,.. I will forgive their iniquity and remember their sin no more” (31:33-34).

“I will make them dwell in safety … I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear me forever, for their own good and the good of their children after them. I will make with them an everlasting covenant, that I will not turn away from doing good to them … I will rejoice in doing them good” (32:37-41).

“As I have brought all this great disaster upon this people, so I will bring upon them all the good that I promise them” (32:42).

These promises are sublime! How heavenly to read, and how glorious that they are ours in Christ Jesus (2 Corinthians 1:20).

Rejoice, dear church. It is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. He is still satisfying weary souls. Has forgiven you your iniquity in Christ. He rejoices over you to do you good. Let us fear him and walk by the light of his word and press on to know this gloriously gracious God!

With wonder and joy,

Ben

Recently when discussing Don Whitney’s 10 questions at the start of the year, my 10-year old son answered “What one humanly impossible thing will you ask God for this year?” with a one word answer: “Puberty.” Ha! Honestly, it sounds like he understood the question, and you can’t blame his desire to grow.

The Apostle Paul modeled for us a passion for growth in the knowledge of Christ. He said he counted everything else in life as loss compared to the surpassing treasure of knowing Christ Jesus (Phil. 3:8). All he wanted was to grow in Christ and to know him more.

In Ephesians 4, he says that’s to be the community project of the church. In fact, it’s why God gave Dave and me to you as your pastors and you to each other as members (Ephesians 4:11,15). We’re to play the part God’s given us, exercising our gifts in building each other up and pressing on together into the knowledge of the Son of God, which he parallels with maturity (Ephesians 4:13).

When we’re mature, we’ll be rooted and grounded in sound doctrine. We won’t get tossed around by falsehoods with a Christian facade on them or by our circumstances, however hard. We’ll be firmly rooted in a deep knowledge of God and his ways, the word of the Christ we’re pressing on to know dwelling deeply in us.

Let’s press on to it together, beloved.

And if you’re looking for one next step in pressing on toward maturity together, can I give you some low hanging fruit? Join us for the next 8-weeks on Sunday mornings from 9-10am from this Sunday, February 1st to March 22nd as we study the historic, Scripture-laden Westminster Confession of Faith. It’s like an 8-week workout plan for our souls. This class is a very practical way of following Paul’s example in doing whatever it takes to know Christ and pressing on together toward maturity in him.

I can’t wait for this study together. If you’re not yet a member of our church, this class will double as a church membership class. You can RSVP here.

With expectation and joy,

Ben

As God called them away from their counterfeit repentance into true repentance from the heart, he declares this to his people:

“Stand by the roads, and look,
And ask for the ancient paths,
Where the good way is; and walk in it,
And find rest for your souls” (Jeremiah 6:16).

Their iniquities and sins had kept God’s blessing and his rest from them (Jeremiah 5:25). But what they needed in the midst of their sin and their unrest was not a new word from God or a different word. What they needed was to remember his good way and to walk in it.

How could they do that?

They needed to look and ask for the well-worn paths of the faithful who had followed God before them. They needed to remember and hear what the One God had said, and they needed to walk the same road as the faithful people of God before them.

Church, as we seek to follow God with our whole hearts, we would be wise to stop and to look and to ask for the ancient paths. We find those as we go to God’s Word, but we also must be sure that we’re not interpreting God’s Word according to our wisdom and our desires. How has the church walked faithfully with God and exalted Christ for thousands of years?

Let us cling to the Word of God and learn from those who have gone before us in church history so that we might walk in his good way and enjoy his peace in the journey.

With prayer and joy,

Ben

Break up your fallow ground, and sow not among thorns. (4:3 )

They had been neglecting God, all while claiming him and bringing him sacrifices. 

They gave him outward obedience and fake repentance. They turned to God in pretense and not with their whole hearts (3:10).

These things were written for our instruction (Romans 15:4). Isn’t it soul searching to consider that we could be deceiving ourselves in thinking that we’re honoring God with outward actions, and we’re not reflective enough to realize our hearts aren’t in our worship? In our Bible reading? In our praying and serving?

Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on us, and help us to see. 

If we remember our Lord’s parable of the soils, we’ll find the same concept of our hearts being soil for the implanted word of God.

Are our hearts hard? Are they laden with the thorns of distraction, looking to entertainment or our phones to satisfy us instead of God?

We clear away the brush and break up our fallow ground by true repentance. 

May God grant us mercy to see both him and ourselves clearly. Clinging to Christ as our righteousness, let us make honest confession, laying aside sin and the things that so easily entangle us, and let us “run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith” (Hebrews 12:1-2). 

For him, and for you,

Ben

The joy of Christmas is ours because Christ is ours, and he is forever. Consider this meditation on the humility of Christ from Augustine:

He, through whom time was made, was made in time; and He, older by eternity than the world itself, was younger in age than many of His servants in the world; He, who made man, was made man; He was given existence by a mother whom He brought into existence; He was carried in hands which He formed; He nursed at breasts which He filled; He cried like a babe in the manger in speechless infancy—this Word without which human eloquence is speechless! -Augustine

What wondrous condescension and staggering humility!

Beholding Christ in his humble love with eyes of faith and standing amazed at his grace is the very root of a life of love and holiness.

Seeing his proactive love will provoke you to love and good deeds that adorn the gospel (Titus 2:10).

Delighting in his humble dependence on God in his perfect obedience to the Father will guard you both from passivity and, as we saw on Sunday, from “initiative without anointing”.

Come adore the humble King, and may we become like him as we behold and are amazed by him.

With love and prayer,

Ben

May the words of this Advent hymn refresh your heart and help you to turn your eyes to Jesus in worship and in hope:

O come, divine Messiah;
The world in silence waits the day
When hope shall sing its triumph
And sadness flee away.

Dear Savior, haste! Come, come to earth.
Dispel the night and show your face,
and bid us hail the dawn of grace.
O come, divine Messiah;
the world in silence waits the day
when hope shall sing its triumph
and sadness flee away.

O Christ, whom nations sigh for,
Whom priest and prophet long foretold,
Come, break the captive’s fetters,
Redeem the long-lost fold.

You come in peace and meekness
And lowly will your cradle be;
All clothed in human weakness
Shall we your Godhead see.

-Simon-Joseph Pellegrin

This Sunday, we’ll rejoice and long with resurrection hope from John 20. We hope you’ll join us and consider inviting a friend to join you.

With love and prayer,

Ben

In Paul’s letter to his beloved spiritual son, in the midst of persecutions without and fears within, he exhorts him very simply: “Remember Jesus Christ” (2 Tim. 2:8). 

He wants him to be strengthened by the grace that’s in Jesus and to faithfully carry out God’s calling on his life. And in the midst of timidity and fear about the suffering that comes with courageously standing with Christ and faithfully proclaiming his gospel, Paul says, “Remember Jesus.”

That’s what Dave and I want this content to be for you each week. 

In the midst of your work. In the midst of fatherhood and motherhood. In the midst of the busyness of life. Amidst joys and sorrows. Amidst happy seasons and heavy ones. When you’re sick and when you’re worried. When your overwhelmed with gratitude or simply overwhelmed, our hope is that through our preaching and through our shepherding, and now through this weekly content, we can help you to “remember Jesus”. 

He is risen from the dead. He is the offspring of David, the true king of his people. He is, as we saw Sunday, the completely sovereign Savior and your protective shepherd. He obeyed the Father perfectly and now, having given you the blessing of his obedience, he is praying for you. He stands ready to help you as you draw near through him to the Father in your time of need. 

Look up, dear saint. Remember Jesus. 

Your elder brother is the King of Kings, and he is for you!  

With prayer + joy, 

Ben