Your COMPASS for the Journey on the PATH of Discipleship: May 22-28, 2011
Posted by Isaac Butterworth | Filed under Discipleship, Puritans, Spiritual Disciplines, Spiritual Formation
Your COMPASS for the Journey on the PATH of Discipleship is a daily resource designed to help you find direction in your walk with Christ. This week, the COMPASS continues with an exploration of the heart of redemption. Your guide is the seventeenth century Puritan pastor, John Flavel. The book, The Inner Sanctum of Puritan Piety, by J. Stephen Yuille is being used as a resource.
Saturday, May 28, 2011 REVIEW
Next week, we will look further into the matter of our union with Christ — specifically at how Christ takes hold of us and how we take hold of him. We are using Stephen Yuille’s book, The Inner Sanctum of Puritan Piety, to follow the teachings of John Flavel, a Presbyterian pastor in seventeenth century England. As we look back over what we have studied this week, let’s recall the three metaphors the Bible uses to convey the intimate nature of our union with Christ. Each in its own way stresses the fact that the church derives its life from Christ. The graft receives its vitality from the stock. The body moves as the head dictates. Eve was taken out of Adam. Flavel says, ‘All divine and spiritual life is originally in the Father, and cometh not to us, but by and through the Son…but the Son communicates this life which is in him to none but by and through the Spirit…. The Spirit must therefore take hold of us, before we can live in Christ.’
Friday, May 27, 2011 HUSBAND AND WIFE
Compass:
Ephesians 5:31-32 ‘…The two shall become one flesh…a profound mystery–but I am talking about Christ and the church.’
31 “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” 32 This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church.
Map:
The third metaphor the Bible employs to describe our intimacy with our Lord is that of husband and wife. In short, the union between husband and wife typifies the union between Christ and his church. John Flavel writes, ‘Though Christ and the soul were two before, two who were strangers to each other, yet in this…espousal they become one….’
Journey:
It is a sorrowful fact that husband and wife may one day be separated by death. But even death cannot separate Christ and his ‘bride’ (the church). As 1 Thessalonians 4:17 says, ‘We will be with the Lord forever.’ Take some time today to spend with the groom of your soul, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Thursday, May 26, 2011 HEAD AND BODY
Compass:
Ephesians 4:15-16 ‘…We will…grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ.’
15 Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. 16 From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.
Map:
A second metaphor Scripture uses to describe our union with Christ is that of head and body. Believers relate to Christ the same way the members of a physical body relate to their head. Likewise, Christ relates to us the same way the head of a physical body relates to its members. Just as the head gives sense and motion to the body, so Christ does for us.
Journey:
The head governs the body, and Christ governs us. Are there areas of your life that you are withholding from Christ’s control? What steps do you need to take to yield to his will for you?
Tomorrow: HUSBAND AND WIFE
Wednesday, May 25, 2011 GRAFT AND STOCK
Compass:
Romans 6:3-7 (KJV) ‘…We have been planted together in the likeness of his death….’
3 Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?
4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:
6 Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.
7 For he that is dead is freed from sin.
Map:
Among the metaphors the Bible uses to describe our intimacy with Christ, there are three upon which we will reflect this week. The first corresponds to agriculture. Romans 6:5 speaks of being ‘planted’ in the likeness of Christ, like a graft being planted into a stock. The stock’s sap passes into the graft. In like manner, we who are engrafted into Christ receive our life from him.
Journey:
Jesus once said, ‘Without me, ye can do nothing’ (John 15:5). What are some steps you can take to ‘abide in Christ’ today? How will you draw your life from him?
Tomorrow: HEAD AND BODY
Tuesday, May 24, 2011 TWO GREAT UNIONS: (2) ‘MYSTICAL UNION’
Compass:
Ephesians 1:11-14 ‘…You were included in Christ…with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit….’
11 In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, 12 in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory. 13 And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.
Map:
We benefit from the covenant of grace by a second great union: the ‘mystical union’ in which the Holy Spirit joins Christ and those who believe in him. The imparting of the Spirit enables us to believe and to live in Christ.
Journey:
You have an intimate bond with Christ, more intimate than that between spouses. This is the work of the Spirit in your heart. How do you honor that bond in your thoughts, words, and actions?
Tomorrow: GRAFT AND STOCK
Monday, May 23, 2011 TWO GREAT UNIONS: (1) ‘HYPOSTATIC UNION’
Compass:
1 John 4:1-3 ‘…Jesus Christ has come in the flesh….’
1 Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2 This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3 but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.
Map:
Our participation in the covenant of grace depends on two great unions. The first of these is what theologians call ‘hypostatic’ union, and what they mean is the union of the divine and human natures in Christ. God the Son took upon himself human flesh. This is what we celebrate at Christmas, the Incarnation.
Journey:
Reaffirm your belief in the Incarnation, which teaches that Jesus Christ is both God and human. By being human, he conquered sin; by being divine, he conquered death. This is all to our benefit.
Tomorrow: TWO GREAT UNIONS: (2) ‘MYSTICAL UNION’
Sunday, May 22, 2011 THREE COVENANTS
Compass:
Luke 1:68-75 ‘…to remember his holy covenant….’
68 “Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel,
because he has come and has redeemed his people.
69 He has raised up a horn of salvation for us
in the house of his servant David
70 (as he said through his holy prophets of long ago),
71 salvation from our enemies
and from the hand of all who hate us—
72 to show mercy to our fathers
and to remember his holy covenant,
73 the oath he swore to our father Abraham:
74 to rescue us from the hand of our enemies,
and to enable us to serve him without fear
75 in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.
Map:
John Flavel (1628-1691) saw in Scripture three covenants: (1) the covenant of works, which God established with Adam, whose failure to keep it brought condemnation to all humanity; (2) the covenant of grace, in which God graciously accepts Christ’s perfect obedience on behalf of those who trust him; and (3) the covenant of redemption between God the Father and God the Son, who agreed before the beginning of time to save God’s people by the covenant of grace.
Journey:
In making covenants, God binds himself to his promises to us. Thank him today for being a promise- making, promise-keeping God. You are assured of his favor not because of your faithfulness but because of his!
Tomorrow: TWO GREAT UNIONS: (1) ‘HYPOSTATIC UNION’
Photo Credit: In Progress: Eden Scarf by Wendi (litlnemo)
May 26, 2011 at 10:34 pm
[…] Your COMPASS for the week of May 29 through June 4 is not only being published early but also in full. Uncontrollable circumstances made this necessary. If you logged on expecting to see the entries for Friday, May 27, and Saturday, May 28, you may find them here. […]