What is Together for Adoption? Check it out here: http://www.togetherforadoption.org

My two boys, Isaiah (6) and Noah (4), treated us to a little dunk session the other day. The videos I created from the footage are below. Which of the two versions below do you like the most (both have the same footage, just with different music)? Also, Isaiah is the right handed dunker. Noah is the left handed one.

(Note: There is a surprise guest appearance by two other family members)

In lieu of flowers, the Chapmans request that all gifts be directed to Maria’s Miracle Fund at Shaohannah’s Hope. You can donate here in memory of Maria Chapman.

A blog has been set up where you can leave a message for the Chapmans.

Here’s a short video of Maria with her Daddy:

The Heidelberg Catechism

Question 1: What is your only comfort in life and death?

Answer: That I with body and soul, both in life and death, am not my own, but belong unto my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ; who, with his precious blood, has fully paid for all my sins, and delivered me from all the power of the devil; and so preserves me that without the will of my heavenly Father, not a hair can fall from my head; yea, that all things must be subservient to my salvation, and therefore, by his Holy Spirit, He also assures me of eternal life, and makes me sincerely willing and ready, henceforth, to live unto him.

Maria Sue, the five-year-old adopted daughter of Steven and Mary Beth Chapman, died Wednesday after being struck in the driveway of their home.

Great, great hymn text:

Lift Up Thy Bleeding Hand

1. When wounded sore, the stricken heart
Lies bleeding and unbound,
One only hand, a pierced hand,
Can salve the sinner’s wound.

2. When sorrow swells the laden breast,
And tears of anguish flow,
One only heart, a broken heart,
Can feel the sinner’s woe.

Chorus
Lift up Thy bleeding hand, O Lord,
Unseal that cleansing tide;
We have no shelter from our sin
But in Thy wounded side.

3. When penitential grief has wept
O’er some foul dark spot,
One only stream, a stream of blood,
Can wash away the blot.

4. ‘Tis Jesus’ blood that washes white,
His hand that brings relief,
His heart that’s touched with all our joys,
And feels for all our grief.

Chorus

©2005 The Velvet Eagle Sings (ASCAP)
admin. by The Loving Company.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.

(HT: Writing on the Wall)

Dr. Joel Beeke, President of Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary, is the graduation speaker for Geneva Reformed Seminary on Friday, June 6, at 7:00 p.m. If you live near Greenville, South Carolina, let me strongly encourage you to attend.

You can learn about Dr. Beeke’s soon-to-be-released book, Heirs with Christ here and pre-order a copy here.

“We have enough in us to move God to correct us, but nothing to move him to adopt us, therefore exalt free grace, begin the work of angels here; bless him with your praises who hath blessed you in making you his sons and daughters” (Thomas Watson, A Body of Divinity, London: A. Fullarton, 1845).

(Quotation taken from Dr. Joel Beeke’s new book Heirs with Christ: The Puritans on Adoption. You can learn more about Heirs with Christ here and pre-order a copy here.)

This is good counsel not only for those who are preparing for the pastorate, but also for those who are now in it:

“Think of the time when you will be the pastor of a congregation and make a vow to God that you will adopt the apostle’s method, that you will not stand in your pulpits sad-faced, as if you were bidding men to come to a funeral, but like men that go wooing a bride or announcing a wedding. If you do not mingle Law with the Gospel you will always mount your pulpit with joy. People will notice that you are filled with joy because you are bringing the blessed message of joy to your congregation…In accordance with God’s will it should be the preacher’s aim to proclaim the Gospel to his hearers till their hearts are melted, till they give up their resistance and confess that the Lord has been too strong for them” (C.F.W. Walther, The Proper Distinction Between Law and Gospel, 406).

Justin Taylor introduces his sermon (23:35) on adoption by considering adoption within Islamic thought in contrast to its central importance within Christianity. I think you will find the entire sermon a great introduction to Scripture’s teaching on God’s gracious provision of adoption.

(HT: Jason Kovacs)

Here’s audio to a sermon by Michael Horton on Galatians 4 entitled “Two Mothers, Two Mountains.”

(HT: Justin Taylor)

Here’s an audio resource where Dr. Wayne Grudem addresses the doctrine of adoption.

(HT: Monergism)

Last night I listened to two sermons by Dr. James Grier on our union with Christ. Dr. Grier teaches part-time at Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary. With a tenderness I’m at a loss to describe, God always uses his preaching to lift my heart afresh in worship of Christ. Here are a few lines from his introduction in part one:

“This concept of union with Christ embraces every aspect of the application of the redemption that Jesus Christ has supplied for his people.”

“Union with Christ is that activity of the Holy Spirit whereby he unites us to Christ as the Last Adam and sustains us in him.”

“Union with Christ is based on his union with us in the incarnation. You cannot understand being united to Christ independently of understanding that he has become united to us through the incarnation.”

Union with Christ - Part One
Union with Christ - Part Two

“Growing as a Christian really means learning to apply the fact of the gospel to every aspect of our thinking and doing” (Graeme Goldsworthy, Gospel and Wisdom).

Dr. Joel Beeke talks about the importance of the doctrine of adoption for the Christian. His new book, Heirs with Christ: The Puritans on Adoption, will be available on June 3rd. You can learn more about this powerful little book here and pre-order a copy here.

Sean writes: “My colleague, Anthony Bradley, has also written well about this reality: these voices in our head, often the voice of our Enemy, often speaking to us with dark and negative words (”you are a loser; no one cares about you; why should you bother? etc.). I wonder, though, how often we have thought about preaching the Gospel to ourselves with the voices that we hear inside ourselves are praising, flattering, and/or boastful.” ~read more

At the center of gospel-centered congregational worship is the double-movement of the incarnate Son, which was brought to its climax in his death and resurrection and continues as he ministers in the Holy Place of God’s presence as our High Priest (Hebrews 8:1-2). In terms of his ongoing high priestly ministry, it is in the incarnate Son, the God-Man, that we find God’s continued gracious movement to man and man’s perfected responding movement of praise to God. This has profound implications for our corporate (and personal) worship.

The writer of Hebrews, attributing the words of Psalm 22:22 to Jesus, puts it like this:

“I will tell of your name to my brothers [the gracious God-to-man movement of gospel proclamation]; in the midst of the congregation I will sing your praise [the responding man-to-God movement of praise]” (Hebrews 2:12).

Focusing on the second half of Hebrews 2:12, it is in this way, I believe, that Jesus is our leitourgos (Hebrews 8:2), the leader of our worship. As our High Priest, Jesus gathers up all of our worship in his own person, with all of its imperfection and frailty, perfects it, and presents it to the Father for us. This is why the Father accepts our worship, not because we have lived as we ought to have lived the week before (we never will this side of our glorification), but because of who Jesus was for us in his life, death, and resurrection, and who he is for us as our High Priest. If there is anything that should free us to worship corporately with joy unspeakable, this is it.

Gospel-centered worship actively recognizes that God has provided us not only with His gracious movement toward us in Christ but also with our responding movement toward Him in Christ. Christian worship, therefore, is participation in what Christ has done in His vicarious life, death, and resurrection and is presently doing as our heavenly High Priest. It is never simply a response to who God is and what He has done.

Part One
Part Two

This is Charlie Boyd on the gospel and being the church in the buckle of the Bible belt:

I adapted the following Sinclair Ferguson quotation, which originally spoke of the pastor’s ministry of the Word, so that it speaks directly to the Christian’s approach to his personal study of the Word:

“The great gospel imperatives to holiness are ever rooted in indicatives of grace that are able to sustain the weight of [Scripture’s] imperatives. The Apostles do not make the mistake that’s often made [by Christians]. [For the Apostles] the indicatives are more powerful than the imperatives in gospel preaching. So often in our [personal study of Scripture our grasp of Scripture’s] indicatives are not strong enough, great enough, holy enough, or gracious enough to sustain the power of the imperatives. And so our [attempt to apply Scripture’s imperatives] becomes a whip or a rod to beat our [own] backs because we’ve looked at the New Testament and that’s all we have seen. We’ve seen our own failure, and we’ve seen the imperatives to holiness, and we’ve lost sight of the great indicatives of the gospel that sustain those imperatives” (adapted from Sinclair’s sermon at 2007 Banner of Truth conference).

Here’s a suggestion for your personal reading of and meditation on Scripture for the remainder of the month of May: First, read the Epistles noting specifically those texts/verses that speak of who you are and what you possess in Christ. Second, pray for spiritual illumination to understand and faith to believe afresh all that you are and possess in Christ. Third, give sustained and prayerful thought on the glory of these great realities so that your heart is lifted up in joyful worship. Fourth, preach the truth of these texts to your own heart every morning, afternoon, and evening with abandon. Fifth, share the fruit of this spiritual exercise with others within the sphere of your Christian community for their spiritual encouragement.

If you decide to follow this suggested plan for the ramainder of this month, please let us know in the comment section and consider blogging about it on your personal blog.

Reformation Heritage Books has just announced Dr. Joel Beeke’s latest book: Heirs with Christ: The Puritans on Adoption. Here’s the Ad for Beeke’s excellent forthcoming book. You can purchase a copy of it here. Both Ligon Duncan and Justin Taylor have endorsed this spiritually rich new book by Beeke:

“Dr. Beeke is well-known for his landmark work setting the record straight on the Puritan doctrine of assurance. Now he comes to our aid again with a superb treatment of the Puritans on adoption. I welcome his expert entry into this important field, and commend his keen insights and careful analysis to all who are interested in knowing ‘what the Puritans really said’ about adoption.” —Ligon Duncan

“In this short but spiritually substantive book, Dr. Beeke—a wise and careful ‘pastor theologian’ in the best sense of both words—introduces us to the Puritans’ comforting and transforming work on spiritual adoption. More than just historically informative, this volume should be warmly welcomed by all Christians who want to learn more about this crucial aspect of our identity as sons of God and joint-heirs with Christ.” —Justin Taylor

Yours truly was given the privilege of writing the foreword. Here’s what I wrote about Heirs with Christ: The Puritans on Adoption:

Foreword

Earthly adoption is horizontal. It is one human being establishing a relationship with another human being. Heavenly adoption is vertical. It is the eternal God graciously establishing a relationship with fallen human beings, creatures who are by nature “children of disobedience” (Eph. 2:2) or “children of wrath” (Eph. 2:3).

God is an adoptive Father. Jesus, our Elder Brother, is God the Father’s eternal, only-begotten, natural Son. We believers are His children through adoption. This identity is central to who we are. As adopted children, we enjoy all the rights and privileges of the relationship that God the Father enjoys with His eternal Son. This is an amazing reality and eternal privilege.

Adoption is heavenly before it is earthly. One is what God does; the other is what we do. Adoption is something God has done and is doing before it is something we have done and are doing. Adoption was invented by God even before He created the world.

Adoption is how God brings us into His family. If adoption is first heavenly before it is earthly, why do we Christians so often think of earthly adoption before we think of heavenly adoption? Why do we think horizontally before we think vertically?

I think one reason for this is the neglect of the doctrine of adoption in the history of the church. In his massive, 2,600-page work The Creeds of Christendom, the church historian Philip Schaff only includes six creeds that contain a section on adoption because they are the only ones he could find while scouring almost 1,900 years of church history.

The early church was primarily concerned, and rightly so, with the doctrines of the Trinity and of Christ because those doctrines were being attacked within the church. The Reformation and post-Reformation church necessarily focused on defending the doctrine of justification. These battles were all essential for the church to fight in the defense of Christian truth, but unintentionally they resulted in the church’s failure thoroughly to develop Scripture’s teaching on adoption.

Even though adoption has been relatively neglected in the history of the church, the Puritans have not contributed to that neglect. To my knowledge, no tradition in the history of the church has rejoiced in and proclaimed the truth of adoption as have the Puritans. Though the Puritans, as of late, have received bad press in their treatment of this great doctrine, their writings demonstrate that they esteemed nothing higher than the incomparable privilege of being God’s children through adoption.

Dr. Joel Beeke offers a great service to the contemporary church by examining the Puritans’ substantial and worship-filled treatment of the believer’s adoption by God. Beeke does a masterful job of setting the record straight on behalf of the Puritans. He has extensively studied the Puritans and is uniquely qualified to write on this most important subject.

The church today should richly benefit from this exposure to Puritan teaching on the biblical doctrine of adoption. If we as Christians even begin to approach the Puritans’ love of heavenly adoption, we will be spiritually richer for it. Therefore, I highly recommend Dr. Beeke’s book: Heirs with Christ: The Puritans on Adoption.