I have been thinking for a while that I need to write a new post before the dust begins to gather on this blog. I wasn’t sure exactly what to write though, as a lot has happened and most of it is difficult to put into words that are worth reading.

Still, I suppose I could write a brief overview of a few things.

One of the biggest things to happen has been the marriage of my best friends to one of the coolest guys out there (I know he’s cool, I spent 20 minutes moving his two BMX bikes from one room to the other, as well as his computer racing wheel and pedal controls. Plus he does rock climbing and stuff.) So the wedding went off without a hitch, no problems, and it was all so fun. Hats off to the best man to at least knowing what was happening all the time, I think I just went with the flow most of the time. I can’t wait to see how the rest of their lives turn out, there’s going to be exciting stuff out there!

This past week has led me to some interesting thoughts. Now, let me explain how my thought process works: it’s very random, often ideas sparked off by seemingly unrelated things, and usually no one else can understand why I come to the conclusions that I do. And, sometimes, those conclusions, when thought through once more, are not as intelligent or reasonable as they first appeared. But anyway, here’s the latest process of thought I have had:

So a few weeks ago one of my main focuses has been to see and learn how I can serve others and show them more of Jesus in me. Which is a seemingly great idea, but I found it incredibly difficult and I often failed.

Fast forward to last week, when the fan on my laptop began to buzz and sound a bit croaky. I decided to book an appointment at the Apple store to have it seen to, and when the day came I gave my computer a light dusting and then looked at the wallpaper on the desktop to decide exactly what to put up there.

Now, usually, there’s some beautiful scenery or such like that I enjoy looking at when my computer first boots up and the screen has yet to be  crowded by opened windows everywhere. But I found myself in a spiritual quandary – do I put up the usual pretty picture, or dig up the wallpapers I made a few years back that feature verses (quite prominently, too) that had inspired me? The question was, in essence, this: do I go for the subtlety of God’s creation or the unconcealed display of His Word? Or, to put it another way: Tuuli, are you embarrassed, or proud of your faith?

Now I’m sure there are many who would pick up on this as a very important point and who would now go on to describe the lesson learned from this realisation. But this is Tuuli-world here, and this new-found knowledge is not the point. No, the story continues:

So I chose a Word wallpaper that looked the nicest and headed into town for my appointment (which, halfway there, I realised was not that day at all, but the next day, and so I had to cancel it and have yet to have my fan seen to).

Fast-forward to yesterday when I was in Sunday worship and really thinking about a lot of things, tons of things, and my mind and my heart were being pressed down by all these things and I really knew that prayer was the only release – not to pray, but to be prayed for. I know there might not be a difference for some, but for me being prayed for is a powerful thing, and often others have the words and the spirit or that gifting that I do not, so their prayers can speak to an issue that mine cannot. But that, again, is not the point. It was afterwards, as I sang, that the verse on that wallpaper that I had put up onto my laptop for an appointment that I missed following on from a fan problem that developed after a weekend of trying to pour out my life into others’ in response to a resolution I had made a few weeks earlier came into my head:

Be still and know that I am God. I will be exalted.
Psalm 46:10

It just about knocked me off my feet! All this time I was concentrating on myself, on how I could serve, how I could love, how I could bless others, when I should have been thinking about how I could serve, love and bless God – I figure, and I think I’m right, that once I’ve gotten round to loving and blessing Him then the loving and blessing of others will all fall naturally into place.

And He will be exalted.

My gosh, I love my God. He’s got patience for even my hair-brained thinking.

Today, also, something was repeated to me in one of the sites I read:

Are you easily edified?

It took a long time, but somehow I have been edified. I hope I continue to be, but perhaps more easily. Wouldn’t that be a great description of ourselves to have?

So I went through a dry time for maybe the last two, three months, but recently God’s just slammed me with some awesome teaching and refreshment from his Word, and also demonstrating to me that often these dry times are not scheduled by Him into my calendar, but a result of not persevering in my pursuit of Him. And I wanna pursue Him! Here’s a list of the things that have been eye-openers for me lately:

Seeking God’s Face

A talk that was particularly influential in that was ‘Is He Enough (Ps 73)’ by Joshua Harris which you can find and download here – it’s under the New Attitude 2004 Conference at the very bottom.

Particularly cool in the message was a letter that Harris reads out from a girl who went from willing God to bless her plans to seeking His face and nothing else for three months – and being transformed by him within one. Totally exciting, and something I’m applying for the rest of the summer!

Not Seeking God’s Will

How controversial does this sound?! But trust me, it’s perfectly sound – another talk from the same conferences, it’s the Guy Talk (yeah, I crossed the gender-divide of conference talks, so sue me!) and I haven’t even finished listening yet but it’s really awesome. The title is Just Do it, by Kevin DeYoung, and it’s also found here under the Next 2009 Conference messages. It’s all about not seeking God’s will but just doing it – particularly interesting was that God rarely revealed a specific will to the disciples in the NT, and only when they weren’t specifically searching for it. Or something. It’s a very general quote, so I do apologise.

Other Resources

Kevin DeYoung name-dropped a couple blogs in his message, and I decided to check one out, Between Two Worlds by Justin Taylor, where there are multiple posts a day with book reviews, Christian resources, theological, philosophical articles and links to awesome stuff there. Through that I found a link to free PDFs of articles and books by DA Carson and have started to read Love in Hard Places, which should be good.

Entertaining Stuff

So I love Brooke Fraser’s music, and I read her blog, and in her most recent one, ‘Spelling Bee’, she writes of the differences between American- and British-English spelling and, I have to say, I’ve never come across anything clearer. If only this has been around earlier in my life!

Then I completed a funny survey that required me to write a haiku (5 syllables, 7, 5) about a time I was in a car during high school. Voíla:

Roll down the windows
Riding the wind with my hand -
Then arm eats a bush.

Finally, here’s the Birmingham weather forecast for the week:

So there’s a lot of random stuff here, but I like to write my thoughts down so that even if I forget them I can be safe in the knowledge that they will forever be on the web thanks to Google’s spiders…

PS Isn’t my header pretty? I just previewed this post and was overwhelmed by its beauty. Haha.

What happens when you don’t want faith?

It means you want a safe and secure life.

It means you’ve got enough strength to focus on yourself alone.

It means you’ll have lots of worries.

It means your life will wander from one place to the next.

It means your life doesn’t need to rely on God.

Here’s what Mark Acuff had to say in A Confession:

My natural inclination to have a secure life that needs little faith ends up being a life that needs very little God, either.  That’s the deadly part of security and safety, we get used to living without God.  There’s no need for God to show up.  “All set, Lord,” becomes our silent, unconscious prayer.

So, increasingly, I’m thankful for a faith-required life because it becomes a God-present life.  What about you?  Does your life require a little faith, or a lot of faith?

So for my dissertation, as you all know, I’m analysing some adverts.

One of them is Kylie Minogue’s advert for the Couture perfume. You can watch the ‘making of’ video for the TV commercial here. One of the interesting things an interviewee said regarding Kylie Minogue was this:

She’s very flirtatious, seductive… Yet not overtly sexual.

Hmm. I’m not entirely sure how he defines any of those three terms because, well, in my book they’re practically synonyms of each other.

The adverts I’m analysing are the following:

Kylie Minogue's Couture Fragrance Print As

After watching the ’making of’ advert for Couture I’ve realised that what I’ve read into the picture is not the same as what they seem to believe they’re putting into it. But I think I know what I’m talking about.

Pretty Fragrance Print ad

The final one is a bit risqué, so I’ve just posted a link to it for those who don’t really feel like their eyes need to be accosted by that kind of thing:
CKin2U For Him For Her Ad

So all in all, a good, diverse set of perfume adverts, all communicating something different but with the same purpose: ‘Buy me! Believe that I can change you!’ In essence.

Colossians 1:19-22

For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven.

And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to preent you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach.

‘If God’s so powerful and good, how come bad stuff happens?’

You’re not asking the question properly. Here’s how you ask that question properly:

‘How on earth can a holy and righteous God know what I did and thought and said on yesterday and not kill me in my sleep last night?’

You ask it that way and we can talk. But until you ask the question that way, you don’t understand the issue. Until you ask it that way, you believe the problem is ‘out there’. Until you ask the question that way, you believe that there are somehow, some individuals who in and of themselves deserve something other than the wrath of Almighty God.

Until you ask me the question that way; until you flip the script and ask the question this way and say, ‘Why is it we are here today, why has He not consumed and devoured each and every one of us, why, why O God, does Your judgement and Your wrath tarry?’

When you ask it that way, you understand the issue. When you ask it the other way, you believe in the supremacy of man: ‘How dare God not employ his power on behalf of almighty man?’ You flip the question around and you believe in the supremacy of Christ.

The problem is - me.

The problem is that I do not acknowledge the supremacy of Christ in truth.

The problem is I start with me as the measure of all things.

The problem is I judge God as to how well he carries out my agenda for the world.

And I believe in the supremacy of me in truth.

And as a result, I want a god who is omnipotent and not sovereign - if I have a god who is omnipotent and not sovereign, I can wield his power, but if I have a God who is both omnipotent and sovereign, I am at His mercy.

Who am I? The crowning glory of the creation of God, knit together in my mother’s womb.

Why am I here? To bring glory and honour to the Lord Jesus Christ.

What is wrong with the world? Me.

And it could have appeared that there was some question of His justice; someone, somewhere, could have asked:

‘God, how can you claim to be righteous when you did not crush Moses, the murderer? You did not crush Abraham – the liar; You did not crush David – the adulterer. How, O God?’

There was a moment in time where some of those questions could have been legitimately asked, but there came a day when God crushed and killed His Son and satisfied His wrath in order that He may be both just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus Christ.

Is that enough to cover Adam’s sin? Was that enough for Moses’ sin? Was that enough for Abraham’s sin? Can you hear the rhetorical questions from Calvary? Was that enough for your sin? Was that enough for you to recognise the supremacy of Christ in truth as it relates to redemption? There was nothing else that could have been done that would have allowed God to be just and our justifier. In His humiliation and His exaltation the question is answered: How, can what is wrong be made right?

What can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
Oh, precious is the flow that makes me white as snow;
no other fount I know, nothing but the blood of Jesus.
There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel’s veins,
and sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains.

How can what is wrong be made right? The spotless, sinless lamb of God was crushed, rejected and killed to pay a debt that He did not owe, on behalf of sinners who can never pay Him back.

Who am I? The crowning glory of the creation of God. Why am I here? To bring glory and honour to the Lord Jesus Christ. What is wrong with the world? Me, and everyone like me, who refuse to acknowledge the supremacy of Christ and live in pursuit of the supremacy of self. How can what is wrong be made right? Through the penal, substitutionary atoning death of the Son of God, and through the repentance and faith on the part of sinners.

You juxtapose these two worldviews (Christ’s and the world’s) and something very interesting happens. On the one hand you are left empty, and hopeless. On the one hand man is left worthless. On the one hand, you are left to pursue your own satisfaction and never find it. And on the other, you are precious. You have purpose. But you are powerless – but it’s OK. Because you are purchased. This is the supremacy of Christ in truth, in a post-modern world. As we walk through the highways and byways and look into the lifeless eyes of the individuals who have bought the lie, let us rest assured that we have found the answer, and we are possessed by the answer. The answer is Christ, and His supremacy in truth.

—

Voddie Baucham.
An excerpt of The Supremacy of Christ from the 2006 Desiring God conference.
Click here to listen to the full talk.