Nathan Forbes and I have been serv­ing in Guatemala City all week with an orphan­age con­nected to Casa de Lib­er­tad, an Acts 29-affiliated church.  Please pray for us to have con­tin­ued strength to serve well and that God would estab­lish last­ing rela­tion­ships between New Life and the peo­ple God is using in Guatemala.  Also pray that God would do great things on our last day there, using us to encour­age, chal­lenge, and bless the chil­dren and fam­i­lies we have got­ten to meet at the church, the orphan­age, and the dump.  We have missed you all (espe­cially our won­der­ful wives, Kendra and Rebekah) and look for­ward to see­ing you soon!

In the tenth chap­ter of Liv­ing the Cross Cen­tered Life, CJ Mahaney focuses on enjoy­ing the results of a cross cen­tered life.  If we have received for­give­ness and jus­ti­fi­ca­tion and the promise of sanc­ti­fi­ca­tion and glo­ri­fi­ca­tion in the Gospel, then we must be men and women of deep joy.  How­ever, many believ­ers are not marked by joy.  I know that I often strug­gle to live in the joy I have been com­manded to live in because I allow my feel­ings and my cir­cum­stances to direct my out­look.  And I am con­vinced that this is most likely because I have for­got­ten God’s deep, per­sonal love for me and for his church in those moments.  We must live with joy, and doing that is pos­si­ble only if our focus is on Christ and his per­fect, com­pleted work on our behalf.

Con­sider these ques­tions (many of which come straight from the chapter):

1. “In your own times of severe dis­tress, which are you more aware of – your suf­fer­ing or your sal­va­tion?” (105)

2. “In the last week, what was your pri­mary pre­oc­cu­pa­tion in life?  What was your spir­i­tual focus?  Was it on that spot where God most reveals His per­sonal love for you – the cross?  Or was it on your own cir­cum­stances, your own con­di­tion, your own con­cerns?” (106)

3. CJ states, “So I urge you every day to ‘preach the gospel to your­self,’ as Jerry Bridges calls it in his book The Dis­ci­pline of Grace” (107).  Do you preach the gospel to your­self?  If so, what does this look like?

4. “Joy is a com­mand,” CJ notes.  “You may be work­ing hard and serv­ing the Lord faith­fully, but if you aren’t serv­ing with glad­ness, you aren’t serv­ing Him appro­pri­ately or rep­re­sent­ing Him accu­rately” (108).  Is your ser­vice in your home, your office, and the church marked by joy, or do you nor­mally appear to be “bur­dened, busy, and eas­ily both­ered?” (108)

Next Wednes­day we will study chap­ter eleven, “Break­ing the Rule of Legalism.”

Charles Spur­geon, one of the great­est preach­ers of all time, wrote an excel­lent work enti­tled, “The Trea­sury of David.”  In this work, he offers detailed com­men­tary on the Psalms for study, reflec­tion, and worship.

I encour­age you to read Spurgeon’s words on Psalm 8 this week for fur­ther study and appli­ca­tion of the mes­sage last night.  I trust you will be challenged!

Con­tinue to pray for me and Nathan Forbes as we serve at Casa de Lib­er­tad and at the orphan­age in Guatemala City this week.  Ask God to give us strength to serve well, faith to believe that God will do great things, and for prov­i­den­tial meet­ings with mis­sion­ar­ies, orga­ni­za­tions, and gov­ern­ment offi­cials that will lead to Gospel opportunities.

If your par­ents are in town for Par­ents’ Week­end, encour­age them to attend ser­vice with you this evening.  It would be a great bless­ing to us to meet them (if we haven’t already) and for them to see the amaz­ing church fam­ily God has placed you in.

Tonight we will study Psalm 8, which is a won­der­ful song of praise to God.  In verses 3–4, David says, “When I look at the heav­ens, the work of your fin­gers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mind­ful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?”  Indeed, God’s spe­cial love for those he has cre­ated should lead us to wor­ship.  We hope to see you this evening at 5 pm!

For the past four days, Jason and I have been in Louisville, KY with thou­sands of other pas­tors from around the world at Together for the Gospel 2010.  We were encour­aged and chal­lenged by Mark Dever, Ligon Dun­can, Al Mohler, CJ Mahaney, John Piper, RC Sproul, John MacArthur, Thabiti Anyab­wile, and Matt Chan­dler.  It was an incred­i­ble time of refresh­ment for us.

Addi­tion­ally, we got to spend time with our fel­low pas­tors from the Acts 29 Net­work and specif­i­cally those from Sojourn Com­mu­nity Church in Louisville.  It was great to inter­act with them and to receive encour­age­ment and advice on every­thing from fam­ily life to church lead­er­ship.  We are truly blessed to be a part of Acts 29.

Finally, be sure to thank our wives for the sac­ri­fices they made this week so that we could be chal­lenged, encour­aged, and refreshed by other pas­tors.  While Jason and I strive to con­tin­u­ally encour­age and thank our wives for their ser­vice and sac­ri­fice (and let me say pub­licly to Kendra and Ash­ley – we love you and could not do this with­out you), it means so much com­ing from oth­ers in the body that rec­og­nize their unique and irre­place­able min­istry in our church.

You can down­load most of the mes­sages, watch videos, and access other T4G resources here.