The Sound of Forehands Clapping » Uncategorized

Glory Makin’

admin — Thu, 06 May 2010 08:29:19 +0000

The Rabbit Trail
The human race was originally made in the image of God, but in the fall that image has been marred, distorted and broken.Christ, the image of God, came to redeem us and conform us back progressively and end the end completely to the image of God. All of His instructions to us are too that end.

There was a time when human beings walked the same earth that we walk and perfectly reflected the character of their creator, displaying the image of God. In mystery they were persuaded by the deceiver and fell. Their character from that moment on was a distortion of his character. No longer could one look at a human and see a consistently accurate reflection of the creator.

Yet, those whom God foreknew he predestined to be conformed to the image of his son. The son of God, Christ Jesus, was not made in the image of God as our parents first were but was himself the image of God. When Phillip asked Jesus to show the disciples the Father he told them that “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.”

Our conforming to the image of the son is captured in Christ’s command to us “You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” That is Christs great instruction to us: Be perfect as your Father is. We have been predestined to be perfect, completely conformed the the image of the son. Nothing more (ha!) and nothing less.

It is in this understanding that Christ’s commands can be seen for what they are: Not commands to do what the commander himself does not do, but directions to son from a father saying “This is what I am like son, be like me.” We can then see this in all the commands:

He commands us to “be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another” because that is what he is like. That is the image of God.

He commands us to “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” because that is what he does in going to the cross for his enemies.

He commands “each one of you speak the truth” because that is what he does. He is the truth and in him their is no falsehood.

He commands us to “love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind” because that my friends is what the father does to the son and the son to the father.

He commands us that “whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” because that is what he is seeking in all that he does.

God’s highest aim is His own glory
Our understanding of how means relate to ends will directly effect our understanding of how God’s love relates to His glory.

I had never heard anyone question the idea that God’s highest aim was his own glory before. Maybe I just don’t get out much. I was asking myself “Why do I hold that belief? Where in Scripture do I find that?” I am definitely still wrestling with the question, but I believe I understand at least part of the reasoning that leads people to this view. Whether or not that reasoning is correct is another question.

If I tell you “I am going to start jogging so that I can lose some weight” you wouldn’t respond “You really must love jogging huh?” No, you’d understand that my goal is not jogging, but is losing weight. If I say “I am buying flowers to show my wife that I love her” you understand that the means (buying flowers) are subordinate to the end (showing my wife my love for her.)

I believe that it is this understanding of means and ends that leads us to believe that God’s highest aim or chief end is to glorify himself. Look at these scriptures:

“In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory.”

“Do not withhold; bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the end of the earth, everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made.”

“For my name’s sake I defer my anger, for the sake of my praise I restrain it for you, that I may not cut you off. Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tried you in the furnace of affliction. For my own sake, for my own sake, I do it, for how should my name be profaned? My glory I will not give to another.”

“For as the loincloth clings to the waist of a man, so I made the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah cling to me, declares the LORD, that they might be for me a people, a name, a praise, and a glory, but they would not listen.”

“Our fathers, when they were in Egypt, did not consider your wondrous works; they did not remember the abundance of your steadfast love, but rebelled by the sea, at the Red Sea. Yet he saved them for his name’s sake, that he might make known his mighty power.”

“Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven: “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.”

“Whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies—in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ.”

And on and on and on and on and on and on it goes. It is abundantly clear in Scripture that God does things, precious things, loving and kind things for the purpose of bringing himself Glory. Now that much should be clear. It quickly raises the question “Does that mean he loves His glory more then us?” I don’t think that is necessarily what it means, but I also am not sure and most importantly I don’t know if that’s the important question: When God loves you enough to shed the blood of his beloved son I think we should be able to put the “Does he love me enough??” question to rest. The most important question “Does God love me?”has thankfully been answered.

So into technicalities. I don’t think that by definition ”means” are “less” then “ends”. But “ends” are “ends” and that is why some of our Fathers have accurately said that “the chief end of man is to glorify God”. That is clear from God’s word, that whatever we do (means) we do it to the glory of God (ends). Likewise God’s chief end in creating this world, and enduring with fallen mankind and redeeming us through Christ (means) was for the purpose of bringing him his glory (ends).

So here’s to hoping that we can all say (without cringing) “He saved us for his own glory!”

No Mr. President

Dwayne Forehand — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 21:18:18 +0000

John Piper provides a thoughtful and firm response to the cloudy, contradictory, and killing view that most of our culture, including our President, holds . . . for now that is.

Posted via email from dwayne’s posterous

Foxes Book of Martyrs

Dwayne Forehand — Fri, 01 May 2009 17:55:16 +0000

Christian Audio dot com offers a different free audio book each month. This months selection is another amazing classic:

Foxes Book of Martyrs

Beginning with the story of Stephen from the book of Acts, considered the first Christian martyr, the drama builds to the passion of the early Church’s persecution under the Roman Empire. The hardy and radical faith of those first believers spawned medieval missionary movements that spread the gospel across Europe and into England, Scotland, and Ireland.

If you prefer actual books you can grab the book on Amazon too.

Excerpt from the Foxes Book of Martyrs

The Gospel Coalition Network from The City NOW OPEN

Dwayne Forehand — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 03:45:56 +0000

Adrian Warnock just made an exciting announcement about 1) the Gospel Coalitions usage of The City and 2) that the doors are open to the public to logon!

I can exclusively announce that the all-new and FREE Gospel Coalition Network website opened just a few minutes ago. The kind people running it have offered blog readers like you the chance to be first in line to join.

If you already know what this is all about, then feel free to head straight over to one of the following links depending on what continent you are from, since this is a genuinely global offer. Don’t worry, you will have access to the whole community no matter where you live. Then, do feel free to mention this on your own blog, or view my profile and add me to your contacts to follow my updates.

To join, simply follow the links:

North America
South America
Europe
Asia
Africa
Australia (and the rest of the Pacific)

Once you join you can hop over to my profile and add me as a contact. A tool like The City is so versatile that it will be very exciting so see what the Gospel Coalition and it’s members do with it!

Posts are Resuming

Dwayne Forehand — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 23:49:25 +0000

Post are back in flow starting this week. Mark will be posting his review of chapter 2 of RBMW today and mine will be out on Wednesday. I also have some other ideas that have been cooking in my head that I need to get down, so hopefully I’ll find time for that this week as well!

Christian Audio dot Com
In the mean time, if you haven’t heard me mention ChristianAudio.com in the past then let me just point you to them for the first time. They’re a great source for Christian audio books. They have a lot of the classics on their site, but also a huge collection of current stuff. Everything is excellently narrated and prices are good.

They also give a way a free title every month. This months is Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life. On the first of each month a new title comes out.

Now for the Important Part!
ChristianAudio created a FaceBook group and promised a $150 gift certificate to whoever invited the most folks to join! As of a few days ago I was in second place, but who knows now. Today and tomorrow are the last days of the contest and so I figured I’d make one more push to win! :D

To help me when first join the group and then go post “Dwayne Forehand” in this thread.

Thanks for the Prayers
Also thanks to all of my friends who have been praying for my family. We really appreciate it and still need it!

RBMW Mark Tubbs on Chapter 1

Dwayne Forehand — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 16:06:36 +0000

This post is part of a larger series of posts by Dwayne Forehand and Mark Tubbs on the book Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (RBMW). The entire book is available online for free here or buy it on Amazon. For a complete list of posts in this series Click here for the series index.

This week Mark’s post is following mine: Read Mark’s review at DiscerningReader.com and, if you missed it, mine here.

What Am I Doing

Dwayne Forehand — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 23:02:46 +0000

To save time I will answer the “so what do you do question” and “what are you up to lately” right here and update it as needed.

Christian
Constantly striving (well sometimes I fall off the wagon) to become more Christ like, grow and use my gifts to edify the body of Christ.

Husband
I’ve been married to my wife, Joy, for 8 years. If I stop and think about what kind of “helper” she is to me it just makes me shake my head in disbelief of all that she does. Our marriage has changed a lot. We both want more from our marriage, but we can look back and see that God has grown us already so much.

Father
Joy and I have 4 children. Right now they make up all the odd numbers between 0 and 8. 7 and 5 year old girls, 3 year old boy and 1 year old baby girl. Like my marriage, there are a lot of areas for me to grow in with regards to being a father, but I am progressing in Him. My children are precious and delicate; The weight of Gods call for me to be a father to them as He is to me is awesome.

Software Developer
I work for the Port of Seattle doing software development. I didn’t go to college – just God’s grace on my family. We used to mainly do Java, but now it’s mainly .NET C#. Web development, web services, mobile development, desktop and on it goes!

Student
I’m currently learning Greek. Slowwwwwwllllyyy learning Greek. I’m also going through a read the bible in a year plan and every day I try to read a sermon or two, a theology article and some good blog posts.

Small Groups
Our family participates in 2 small groups through our local church right now. One of them is going through some discipleship material and the other is a straight bible study. The first one has more older folks in it which my wife and I really need and appreciate. The second one is mainly folks our age and has been good for fellowship.

Blogging
I made a concerted effort recently to start getting my thoughts down on paper, er, blog. It’s been good. I haven’t posted as much as I’d like, but it still has caused me to wrestle more with my thoughts when I do post. I am not under the delusion that I have anything new to offer – there are so many men who are exponentially more qualified and gifted to teach then myself – but I think a good test for whether or not I am “getting it” is if I can re-explain it in my own words.

Kids Need to Know

Dwayne Forehand — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 05:06:57 +0000

Again I am perplexed: Where are the parents?

Parents, this is an exhortation to you. If you’re unable to come to this event, seek another. Learn how to teach your kids about sexual abuse as well as to learn how to handle the abuse when it does happen. Statistics show it likely will.

The same exhortation goes to you: child care worker, children’s ministry volunteer, teacher, grandpa, grandma, aunt, uncle. You could be the first person the child feels safe to tell, or the first one to see signs and symptoms of abuse.

The above quote is from a friend of mine who organized a presentation on sexual abuse prevention that my wife and I attended today. Annette Schuster of Kids Need to Know presented a lot of good information. Let me emphasize a lot. She dispelled myths, shared statistics, spoke on what Scripture had to say, gave very practical advise on how to prevent abuse and more.

She said that many, many churches are not been open to having a presentation like hers to educate people on how to prevent a lot of the sexual abuse of our children. Why? Why? Why could that possibly be? I am sitting at the table here shaking my head and trying to put my trouble comprehending this into words.

1) Rape and molestation of precious little, made in the image of God children is prevalent.

2) There are things we can do if we know them to prevent much of it.

3) A lot of these things defy common conceptions

4) Learning from someone who works a lot in this field can help with 3, 2 and out of that hopefully 1.

The Kids Need to Know website has some simple, free resources and some other very affordable resources that go into more depth.

If you have a child and are uninformed about child abuse, what it is, how it happens, how perpetrators work and steps to prevent abuse then you need to change that.

There are other resources I am sure. If you know of others, especially good free online ones, please do share.

Reading Plan Progress Update

Dwayne Forehand — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 17:24:38 +0000

I began a reading plan on January 4th this year. Here’s a little update on my progress. If I had started the plan on the first of the month then I should have already read:

Matthew 7
Acts 10
Psalm 15
Genesis 35

Here is what I have actually read through:

Matthew 10
Acts 10
Psalm 7
Genesis 12

So Matthew good, Acts good, Psalm eh, Genesis doah! I have a bit of catching up to do, but I’m determined to end each month on target and, more importantly, to build the habit of reading the Scritpures most days (Resolution 14 if you are keeping track.)

Did you start a reading plan this year? We are only 2 weeks into it. How is it going?

Thinking in the Gaps

Dwayne Forehand — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 18:02:06 +0000

The Unashamed Workman brought up this quote in a short post:

“There were…necessary safeguards to [Calvin's] reasoning process. In dealing with any biblical text, Calvin purposed not to exceed what Scripture itself taught. The Reformer was careful not to enter the realm of speculation. As Calvin said, ‘Where the Lord closes His holy mouth, let us also stop our minds from going any further.’ In other words, he would say no more than Scripture.”

(Steve Lawson, “The Expository Genius of John Calvin”, p 79)

It really got me thinking about how much time I spend speculating over the “gaps” in Scripture. He clarified that he isn’t saying he thinks it is always wrong to speculate. When would it be okay though? For example say you come across this passage in Genesis:

Whoever sheds the blood of man,
by man shall his blood be shed,
for God made man in his own image.

God is saying that whoever commits murder will be killed. The implication seems clear, murder is wrong. Why is murder wrong and why should it be punished you ask? God gives the answer “for God made man in his own image.” See, murder is wrong because we are made in the image of God . . . Hmm, ok, but what is it about being made in the image of God that makes murder sin?

If seems as though God expected his answer would make sense to us, but what if it doesn’t. Is it okay to “try and figure out” in your head what Gods reasoning might be?