Personal Covenants (Part I) | Behold Your God Podcast

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Welcome to another episode of the Behold Your God podcast. I'm Matthew Robinson, director of MediaGratia, and I'm here again with Dr.

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John Snyder, pastor of Christ Church, New Albany, and author of the Behold Your God series.

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Before we get started today, this is just past Christmas, and we got some Christmas presents from our friends at the

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Banner of Truth Trust. So, John, what did you get? All right. Yeah, so this is a banner box.

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Matt, can you explain banner box for us? Yeah, this is just something that the banner put together. So you could give this to your theology nerd friend, or you could give it as a great intro to people who, like, why are you always reading these old books, and what is all of this?

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So what's in your box? Yeah, so the banner box comes with some things, just some nice little things.

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Here's a series of bookmarks with quotes from different believers,

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Spurgeon, Rutherford, Calvin. Looks like Richard Baxter. Yep, and A .A.

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Hodge. So, also comes with a mug, which

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I don't actually have one of these yet. So Matt promised me that I can actually keep this mug.

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All right, so not that we have any room for another coffee mug in our house, but here's a nice coffee mug,

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Banner of Truth. And then it comes with the most important thing, the books. Okay, so in this box, there's

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John Owen on the Mortification of Sin, which is a really simple, helpful book.

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I mean, Owen was a giant brain, and I think people get afraid of reading Owen because they think that, well, look, it's 400 years ago or such, you know, and I don't know that I can keep up with him.

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I'm not much of a reader. But while Owen is precise, I think that Banner does a really great job when they do abridge him of being true to the content, but making it very readable.

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So there's Owen on the Mortification of Sin. And here's a book by Sinclair Ferguson, especially for the season,

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Child in the Manger, the True Meaning of Christmas. So really great stuff. Yeah, very cool.

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Let's see what's in mine. I think you got the sort of the beginner box, the intro box. I think

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I got leveled up over here because I have the bookmarks that you have, which are very cool, nice, glossy bookmarks.

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But I also have this nice Scottish leather fringy bookmark, which it smells like that's real leather, nice and pretty.

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Let's see what else. This is the deluxe box. It also comes with the cool coffee mug, which

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I have one of, but our producer extraordinaire TJ does not have.

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So this can be TJ's mug now. That's his Christmas mug. Yeah, and then look at this.

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What's this? I think Lloyd -Jones wore that. Yes, this is actually

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Lloyd -Jones' tie. Very cool. This must be the second run because look at this, banner of truth tag on the back of it.

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So all banner men need a banner tie. And then getting to the goods here.

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What do we have? The letters of John Calvin with an introductory biographical sketch.

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Kevin DeYoung says, this is one of my favorite books. My copies highlighted, underlined, and fallen apart from constant use.

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Students of Calvin as well as pastors and serious Christians will enjoy these letters. I'm thrilled that the banner of truth has reissued this classic.

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Much like you mentioned with Owen and so many of these guys, people probably have a certain idea of what it would be like to read

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Owen or certainly what it would be like to read Calvin. And I had that all growing up. I mean,

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Calvin was a name that I heard all the time, but I assumed that he would be very cold and sort of mechanical and methodical.

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The Institutes disabused me of that. He's very warm and devotional and his letters are certainly no exception to that.

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Saved by Grace Alone, Sermons on Ezekiel 16 -36 by Martin Lloyd -Jones.

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So that's hard to beat. Another nice big book. And then a book called

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The Glory of Grace, An Introduction to the Puritans in Their Own Words by Lewis Allen and Tim Chester.

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This is not one that I have, but it looks good, man. This looks like the kind of thing you could put in somebody's hands.

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You say, why do you always read these old guys? And, you know, why does Banner republish this stuff? So maybe, you know,

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Christmas has passed, but I bet you that people in your life would be super happy to get one of these and open them up if you're looking for that gift.

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This is probably a good one. So thanks, Banner. You know, it's one of the perks of having good friends and good publishers that we get cool presents like that.

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You know that you can go to the Banner of Truth Trust and pick up either of the studies in the

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Behold Your God series. You can go there and get the Rethinking God Biblically study or the

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Way to Majesty study. And they also carry the Logic on Fire film and the Deluxe Edition box set.

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So take a look at that and all the other excellent resources that the Banner of Truth makes.

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So we're here at the sort of the beginning of the year. We're about to be in the beginning of the year.

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By the time you guys hear this, it'll be January. And that's a time when people start to think a lot about what's ahead.

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It's a really good time to take stock over the last year to look back and see, well, the kindness of the

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Lord, his faithfulness to you. You know, I often remark that in life, as when we look in the rearview mirror, all we can see is

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God's faithfulness to us. I mean, it's all that we see. And yet when we look ahead, we're often guilty of thinking, well, but yeah, but he's brought us this far.

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But, you know, from going forward, it's up to us. And what will we do? So, you know, it is a great time to look back and take stock and remember the kindness of the

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Lord and remember his faithfulness. But it's also a great time to look forward. So New Year's resolutions are popular.

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Yeah, I remember hearing about a guy who said his business plan was to open a business called

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Resolutions and the first two months, it's a gym and the next 10 months, we'll say it's a donut shop.

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Yeah, that would be good. Yeah, resolutions are not always things that we keep.

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It's almost a byword. It's almost kind of a joke in our culture. But resolutions are good.

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They're the kinds of things that our fathers in the faith all down through Christian history, we see them making use of resolutions and personal covenants with God, which is what we want to talk about today.

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Yeah, well, when we did the second Behold Your God, we talked a lot about John Owen and it was fascinating for me personally because I didn't know that at the end of every year, did

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I say John Owen? No, Newton. Okay, sorry. So with John Newton, at the end of every year,

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John Newton would just review the year and then at the end of a decade, he would review a whole decade and it was one of those times where Newton was sitting down and reviewing the year, the kindnesses of the

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Lord and he would consecrate himself afresh to the Lord out of gratitude for God's kindness, but he would also write a hymn and that's where Amazing Grace came from and he would write it for his church.

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So now I have no poetic ability at all and no musical ability.

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So at the end of the year, I certainly don't sit down to write a new hymn for our church to sing, but most of us do as believers, if we can take time just to slow down after the hectic pace of Christmas and before the beginning of a new year, as we look over those kindnesses of the last year and our response to those kindnesses and many times we have to say honestly to the

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Lord, my response to your grace, it has not been what it should have been. It's not been what it could have been.

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So it does move us to want to, in some manner, recommit, re -consecrate ourselves and so yeah, the personal covenants, where do those come from?

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Well, this is a little section from a book that Medi Gratia and Reformation Heritage Books are putting together to be part of the

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Puritan project that is coming out in the summer of 2019. There's a little book.

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It's not a little book. It's actually a really nice -sized book by Dr. Joel Beakey and Michael Reeves called

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Following God Fully and it's an introduction to the Puritans book as well and there's a little chapter in there,

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Puritans on Covenant and they mentioned that the Puritans recommended that individuals make and record their own personal covenants whereby they confessed what they believe, repented of their particular sins, and committed themselves to follow

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Christ in new obedience. So I don't know that it began with the Puritans, but it's certainly something that we can go back and see and take some encouragement and then certainly the generation to follow, you know, and forward have used these beneficially.

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I do want to point out to everyone listening that, you know, the covenant is a very biblical theme and we need to be clear that we don't mean it in that special sense that this, the great covenants that we see in Scripture.

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So what some have called the Adamic administration or the covenant of works, what theologians call the covenant of redemption, the covenant of grace, and we don't mean those covenants where we see

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God coming to someone in the Scriptures to initiate a covenant. So the Noahic covenant or the

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Abrahamic covenant. What we're talking about here is not that kind of covenant. This is, so help us kind of differentiate what we mean here.

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Yeah, in the Scriptures, we, and in the ancient world, we find that covenant is always initiated by the monarch, by the one who possesses the ability to do and to give and to help.

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And it's all, so it's initiated from the monarch and it's responded to by the subject. And so, you know, it would be very inappropriate for us in talking about personal covenants if we decided that that means that what we're saying is that we have a right to initiate a covenant with God.

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So we come to God and a covenant always has two sides. So we come to God and we say to God, well, actually,

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I'm really interested in being a better person next year, but I'm gonna need some help. So I'm gonna write a covenant instead of just New Year's resolutions.

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And in this covenant, God, I expect you to do such and such. And we would have no right as the subject to come to the king vertically and say, here's the agreement and we want you to sign on the dotted line.

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So that would be inappropriate, but it would also be inappropriate if we came to God and said, okay,

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God, we see in the scripture what you say you will do. And we're so grateful for that.

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And here's what I plan to do this year. And we kind of craft our idea of what

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Christianity would look like for us this year. And so we say, I'm willing to do this much, but I'm not willing to do that.

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And so no subject of the king has a right to come to the king and say, I realize you're the king, but let me state that in 2019, this is all

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I intend to give you. So in those ways, a covenant could be very inappropriate. For a covenant to be an appropriate expression of our loving response to our

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Savior, it would need to be a covenant that flows from top to bottom.

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So if we're gonna write anything out to the Lord, then really all we're doing is saying this.

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I like to summarize in a way that's personal for me, in a way that fits my life in particular, as I look at my slow responses or as I look at the needs of my life.

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God, this is what you said in Scripture that you would be for your people, what you would do.

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And I'm just trying to summarize that in an easy to grab hold of form. And this is what you say in Scripture that your people owe you.

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And so I want to kind of try to boil that down in a way that in a simple way, I can review these things and help move my soul forward.

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Yeah, I think about a passage that comes to mind in taking God's words and bringing them back to Him in this form of a personal commitment, a covenant.

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In 2 Peter 1, 5 -11, where Peter says, now for this very reason also, applying all diligence in your faith, supply moral excellence.

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And in your moral excellence, knowledge. And in your knowledge, self -control. And in your self -control, perseverance.

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And in your perseverance, godliness. And in your godliness, brotherly kindness. And in your brotherly kindness, love.

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For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our

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Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short -sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins.

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Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about his calling and choosing you.

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For as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble. For in this way, the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our

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Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you. Now there's, that's a great example of exhortation, promise.

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These are things that, you know, we're not making up. These are things that we're reading in the scriptures verbatim.

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I read this and I see a command to me. I don't, this is not something that I need to go to God and say, now

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God, just, you know, supply moral excellence and, you know, supply perseverance and supply some brotherly kindness.

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The scriptures command me to do these things. But where am I gonna draw strength to do these things?

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I mean, there's no strength in me to do these. Even with a renewed nature, there's weakness and inability.

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So where do, what do we do with that? Well, we have to take God's words. As Augustine said,

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Lord, command what you will and grant what you command. So we can summarize these things perhaps and say,

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Lord, you've commanded me to do these things. And you've even told us what would happen if we do.

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I don't wanna be useless. I don't wanna be unfruitful in the true knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ.

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In 2019, I wanna be fruitful. I wanna bear fruit. I wanna be used by you. I don't wanna be blind.

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I don't wanna be short -sighted. I don't wanna forget what you've done in saving me. I would love to be able to lay hold of this promise that as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble.

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I don't wanna stumble. I wanna have this entrance to the eternal kingdom abundantly supplied to me.

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I mean, these are wonderful things. So your word tells me to do these things.

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And I intend to do them. But Lord, you will have to help. You'll have to give grace.

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Yeah, Paul tells us that it's God who is at work in us both to will, to desire, to long for, and to do this, his good pleasure.

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So there's an example of what it might look like to take God's words. And so this is not us saying, now

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God, I'm thinking I'll do this. And if I do this, you need to do this, you know, bargaining with the

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Lord, trying to manipulate him. That's not the way that we approach the sovereign king of the universe.

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But when we take his words back to him, when we can, in that Augustinian sense, say,

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Lord, command what you will and grant what you command. Yeah, so if we guard ourselves against the inappropriate crafting of a covenant, if we understand it's a summary of what he has said in his word, and we're just trying to lay it out in a way that particularly suits where we see that we're weak.

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Perhaps there are areas, you know, that the Lord has really laid his finger on our life and said that this is an area where we have not brought our heart, mind, soul, and strength under that wonderful influence of his love.

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We've not given him what we owe him. And so we're taking the scripture, we're summarizing that in a way that we can quickly remind ourselves.

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There are still dangers, even if it's a biblical expression, or even if it's an appropriate expression of what the scripture says.

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There are some dangers with a personal covenant. And one of those would be legalism. That is that we shift from seeing

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Christianity as an ongoing, loving response to a person. We shift from that to seeing

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Christianity as me keeping a list of rules that I've written down, even if they're biblical rules.

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And if we do that, then legalism tends to set in, and we become law -oriented, rule -oriented instead of person -oriented.

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Now, when we talk about being person -oriented, we're obviously not saying there's no law or rule, but the motivation is very different.

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So in legalism, we're motivated perhaps by us wanting to be a better us, all right?

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So in the year 2019, John Snyder wants to be a better John. I wanna be a better dad.

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I wanna be a better husband, a better Christian, a better pastor, a better friend. So I'm gonna use this to make

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John better. It's kind of like a treadmill, you know? I get on my treadmill. What's the goal? Well, I'm not, you know, my kids, if they were young, they might walk in the room and say, where are you walking?

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Well, actually, I'm not going anywhere. I'm gonna be a skinnier, healthier, happier John. So we don't wanna use the covenant for that.

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We want to use it in a way that stirs us to live for God, not just for a list of rules.

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Yeah, I would also think that the danger there would be that we begin to shift the ground of what makes us right with God from the perfect work of Christ on our behalf to how well are we keeping with this covenant, with our intentions.

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So today, I did a pretty good job, you know? I kept some of these resolutions that I made.

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Well, tomorrow, oh no, I didn't keep any of these resolutions. And so now, where are we, you know?

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I've broken covenant with God. Am I out of His covenant now, you know? So no, no personal covenant that we ever use will have any bearing on God's covenant of grace that He, you know, puts the believer in.

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And that's the environment that we live in. And any personal covenant that we make should be rooted and grounded in the unconditional covenant of grace that God has placed us in.

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Yeah, and that brings us to a covenant that we want to talk about today by William Grimshaw. Now, you may not be familiar with William Grimshaw.

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Grimshaw was a co -worker with George Whitefield and John Wesley. William Grimshaw agreed with Whitefield in his theology, a more

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God -oriented theology that was in line with the Reformers. John Wesley at that time, kind of the odd man out in the early days of the

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Great Awakening in the UK, which they call the Evangelical Revival. So we're talking about early 18th century.

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So Grimshaw was a warm -hearted, aggressive, what would get labeled today,

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Calvinist. He was also a Church of England minister. And the Lord used him in such an extraordinary way in the north of England in a place called

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Haworth. And he was converted while being a minister. And after his conversion, he was reading a book by Philip Doddridge, who we know sometimes from some of his hymns that he wrote.

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And he was a very close friend of Isaac Watts. So Philip Doddridge wrote a book called The Rise and Progress of Religion in the

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Soul. And it was kind of the popular devotional book of that century. At the end of the book, he gives an example of what a personal covenant might look like.

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Now, William Grimshaw had written a number of personal covenants, like many of the 18th century men, because they were converted, or they grew as Christians by reading a lot of the

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Puritans. So they read the Puritans. They decide, I need to implement this tool of a personal covenant.

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After writing a number of his own personal covenants, he came across this covenant that Doddridge put in the back of his book.

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And he felt that really it just summed it up. And he took it, almost verbatim, really, there's only a few,

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I would say less than 5%, a few of the words there that aren't Doddridge's. And he wrote it down in his own journal.

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And he reviewed this quarterly for the rest of his life in order to stir himself up.

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And I think that what you said about the idea of a personal covenant having no part of the foundation of our peace with God really comes clear in Grimshaw's covenant.

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Because we're going to see as we work through that now, that almost half of this covenant, it's not resolutions.

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It's stating to God. It's bringing the heart to God and saying, it's what you have done that forms the foundation of any hope that I have in you.

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Yeah, so this is in, you can read this covenant for yourself. It's the appendix, the second appendix, in the back of Faith Cook's book,

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William Grimshaw of Haworth. Is it Haworth or Hayworth? I say Haworth, but we're over on this side of the pond.

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Yeah, we'll have to ask David Woolin at RHB because that's literally where he's from. He's from the same little village there.

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But this is published by the Banner of Truth. You can pick it up. William Grimshaw of Haworth.

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And I'll read it. I'll read it section by section and we'll just stop and discuss it.

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So Grimshaw's covenant with God begins. Eternal and unchangeable

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Jehovah, thou great creator of heaven and earth and adorable

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Lord of angels and men. I desire with deepest humiliation and abasement of a soul to fall down at this time in thine awful presence and earnestly pray that thou will penetrate my heart with a suitable sense of thine unutterable and inconceivable glories.

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Trembling may justly take hold upon me when I, a sinful worm, presume to lift up my head to thee, presume to appear in thy majestic presence on such an occasion as this.

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What is my nature or descent, my character or desert that I should mention or desire to be one party in a covenant where thou, the king of kings, art the other?

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I blush even to mention it before thee. So from the very beginning, he's establishing who he is and who he's approaching.

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Yeah, and the wonderful sense of the gulf between the uncreated and the created.

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I mean, if we don't start there, then we use a covenant to try to manipulate God. Yeah, and it's not just empty words it can't be.

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I would like to live every day in awe of the fact that the God of the universe, the eternal and unchangeable

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Jehovah is and is the one before whom

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I live. I mean, we would we would live differently. Who would who would choose to sin in the before the face of such a

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God? So it's it's a great it's a great kind of thing to review and to keep in mind daily.

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Grimshaw goes on, but oh, Lord, great as is thy majesty. So also is thy mercy.

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If thou hold converse with any of thy creatures, thy superlatively exalted nature must stoop infinitely low.

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So in that short section that you've just read, wonderful word picture that the that the infinite transcendence of God's majesty is matched by something else, an infinite mercy that makes a king like that be willing to stoop low, to delight, to stoop low, to hold converse with us, to hold, to enter into a relationship with specks of dust like us.

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I know that through Jesus, the son of thy love, thou condescendest to visit sinful mortals and to allow their approach to thee and their covenant communion with thee.

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Nay, I know the scheme and plan are entirely thine own and that thou has graciously sent to propose it to us as none untaught by thee could have been able to form it or inclined to embrace it even when actually proposed.

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So here Grimshaw starts what's going to flow through the rest of the covenant.

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He turns specifically to the person and work of Christ that it's not just that there's a man on earth who feels his need, feels his sin, feels the chasm between him and his creator and then hopes that in the heart of God, there's mercy.

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Yeah, but that is actually actively been expressed in the God -man and that those objective historical accomplishments of Jesus of Nazareth form all the hope of these of the uncreated

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God and a creature like William Grimshaw coming together. Yeah, I love to that.

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Not only are we not twisting God's arm, but on a much higher on an infinitely higher level,

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Christ is not now going to the father and kind of twist in his arm and saying now you have to have mercy on these people.

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No, it's God's great scheme to reconcile humanity to himself, his people to himself through his son.

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God is the one who initiated and God is the one who sent. So that's he's just building the foundation, you know, one at a time to thee.

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Therefore, because of these things, do I now come invited by thy son and trusting in his righteousness and grace, laying myself at thy feet with shame and confusion of face and smiting upon my breast, saying with the humble publican,

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God be merciful to me a sinner. Yeah, wonderful again picture.

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He's just as you mentioned, it's like he's laying a foundation. It's like he's he's the door has been thrown open by God and he is just he's laying the furniture in the room and you know that the

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Almighty and the speck of dust William Grimshaw might walk together and notice what he says here to thee therefore, so the motivation of the extraordinary mercy of God moves him.

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But also there's another thing I have in my hand. We could say the invitation of your own son to come and I'm doing this trusting in his righteousness and grace.

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Yeah, so he goes on. I acknowledge Oh Lord that I have been a great transgressor.

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My sins have reached up into heaven and mine iniquities have been lifted up into the skies.

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My base corruptions and lusts have numberless ways wrought to bring forth fruit unto death and if thou wert extreme to mark what

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I have done amiss I could never abide it but thou hast graciously called me to return to thee though I am a prodigal son and a backsliding child.

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We certainly hear echoes of Oh Lord, if you kept record of iniquity who could stand?

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Yeah, I think that Grimshaw is a helpful guide here. In our culture even like you know within the

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Reformed camp the emphasis on the grace of God which has to be the starting place the greatness of God the great love of God.

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It can reach a place where we forget that we are still needy people and this kind of talk

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God be merciful to me a sinner I acknowledge my great transgressions they've reached to heaven my base corruptions my lusts in numberless ways look what they've done in my life.

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You can almost get the idea that that's a very inappropriate way for a Christian to talk we're just to say no, now that I'm in Christ I don't talk about that anymore but I think that with Grimshaw we have a good guide because there's an honest confession like we read in the

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Psalms this is what I am apart from you but I am not apart from you and so I don't despair but I do need to be honest about the depth of my need.

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Yes, so he's acknowledged the inexpressible glory of God he's acknowledged his own sin and he says behold therefore

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I solemnly come before thee oh my Lord I come convinced of my sin and folly thou knowest oh

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Lord I solemnly covenanted with thee in the year 1738 and before that wonderful manifestation of thyself unto me at church and in the clerk's house between the hours of 10 and 2 o 'clock on Sunday, September 2, 1744

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I had again solemnly devoted myself to thee on August 8, 1744 and now once more and forever

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I must solemnly give up devote and resign all I am spirit, soul and body to thee and to thy pleasure and command in Christ Jesus my

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Savior this 4th of December, 1752 sensible oh

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Lord of my vileness and unworthiness but yet that I am thy pardoned justified and regenerated child in the spirit and blood of my dear and precious

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Savior Jesus Christ by clear experience yeah that's quite the paragraph so he mentions the previous covenants that he's tried to express his love to God through 1738 is conversion 1744 again in 1744 and 1752 and then this follows throughout the rest of his life but I think that that paragraph that you just read

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Matt you know the previous paragraph talks about the work of Christ for him is the foundation of any consecration of himself but this paragraph you know ends with a statement about his identity in Christ Jesus what

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God has made me I am thy pardoned justified and regenerated child and it is in this new identity that he is able to repeatedly come to the throne of mercy and grace and to give himself again and again yeah it's so important I mean he does say

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I am sensible Lord of my vileness and unworthiness but I am sensible of who

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I am in Christ because of Christ and that is a that is a great thing for us to work toward being sensible of he continues glory be to thee oh my triune

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God permit me to repeat and renew my covenant with thee I resolve and desire to be holy and forever thine in thy spirit blessed

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God I most solemnly surrender myself unto thee here

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O heaven and give ear O earth I have vouched this day the Lord God to be my

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God father Savior portion forever I am one of his covenant children forever record

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O eternal Lord in thy book of remembrance that henceforth I am thine forever from this day.

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I solemnly renounce all former Lords world flesh and devil in thy name no more directly or indirectly.

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Will I obey them? I renounced them many years ago and I renounce them forever this day.

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I give myself up to thee a living sacrifice holy and acceptable unto thee and which

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I know is my reasonable service to thee I consecrate all my worldly possessions.

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So here we really start what we think of in the personal covenant or a resolution the expression of what he is to devote to the father and you know it wonderful statements here.

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I resolve and desire to be holy and forever thine and then the renouncing of all other masters.

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I solemnly renounce all former Lords Lord world, you know, we could say

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Lord flesh Lord devil in thy name no more directly or indirectly.

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Will I obey them? I consecrate all to him.

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Just another great example of the order here Grimshaw is not saying now

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God, I'll do ABC if you'll just save me, you know, and and I'm going to I'm going to renounce these

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Lords and make you my Lord so that I can go to heaven. No, he begins with I am sensible that I am your pardoned justified and regenerated child and because of that Oh Lord, I renounce all of these lesser

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Lords these despicable Lords. Yeah, and Matt, I think that you know in our day, it's not so much today, but in the last, you know, 30 years there's been a lot of debate on the issue of Lordship and even the we were reading

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Beaky's and Michael Reeves statement before we started the podcast about the use of personal covenant and how that can be an expression of our recognition of Christ's Lordship.

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But some people think that when we talk about Lordship with regard to salvation that we're talking about a legalism.

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We're kind of like on a scale of 0 to 10 or 1 to 10. 10 is Christ is

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Lord. So I obeyed him 10 out of 10 today, but 4 out of 10 that's

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Jesus just as my Savior and I don't care about obeying him. But really what Grimshaw is saying here and what you pointed out,

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I think settles this whole question. It is because of who he is, he is

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Lord and who I am in him that I gladly renounce every other

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Lord and I would never if you ask me and my mind is thinking straight.

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I would never want another Lord but him, you know, Lordship is the expression of the grateful

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Christian to their Lord who has rescued them. You know, there's not legalism here. It's not a scale of 1 to 10.

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It's the recognition of this, you know, this captivating love that's come from a king and I want to respond to that.

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So he continues. In thy service, I desire and purpose to spend all my time desiring thee to teach me to spend every moment of it to thy glory and the setting forth of thy praise in every station and relation of life.

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I am now or may hereafter be in and earnestly pray that whatever influence thou mayest in any wise give me over others thou would give me strength and courage to exert it to the utmost of thy glory resolving not only myself to do it but that all others as far as I can rationally and properly influence them shall serve the

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Lord. Here Grimshaw turns from just the consecration of his his soul, his being to God to how he wants to covenant that every day in the in the occupation that he has now, he's a minister but it could apply to anyone that in the present situation where God has placed me

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I want to devote all my energies to the glory of God and not just individually but as much as I have influence on others

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I want to help them to devote themselves to that same glory. Yeah, and that it's certainly not just for the minister is it?

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I mean, it's for all of us wherever we are whether it's our children watching us as we do things in the home during the day or it's our co -workers.

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You know, I hear echoes of Christ saying that we don't light a lamp and and put it under a basket, but no, it's put in a prominent place where it brings light to the whole house.

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And so, you know, this is just all of us could pray this that that we desire to spend all of our time and whatever influence that the

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Lord has given us in others lives to influence them to serve the Lord.

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So he goes on in that course would I oh Lord steadfastly preserve to my last breath steadfastly praying that every day of my life may supply the defects and correct the irregularities of the former and that by divine grace

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I may be enabled not only in that way happy to hold on but to grow more daily active in it.

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Nor do I only consecrate all I have to thy service, but I also most humbly resign and submit to thy holy and sovereign will all that I have leave in that course would

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I oh Lord steadfastly preserve to my last breath steadfastly praying that every day of my life may supply the defects and correct the irregularities of the former and that by divine grace.

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I may be enabled not only in that happy way to hold on but to grow more daily active in it.

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Nor do I only consecrate all I have to thy service, but I also most humbly resign and submit to thy holy and sovereign will all that I have.

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I leave oh Lord to thy management and direction all that I possess and all

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I wish and set every enjoyment and interest before thee to be disposed of as thou pleasest continue or remove what thou hast given me bestow or refuse what

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I imagine I want as thou seest good and though I dare not say I will never repine yet I hope

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I may say I will labor not only to submit to it but to acquiesce not only to bear thy heaviest afflictions on me but to consent to them and praise thee for them countedly resolving in all my appointments my will into thine esteeming myself as nothing and thee oh

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God as the great eternal all whose word should determine and whose power should order all things in the world.

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Extraordinary paragraph where he is stating that he wants to leave to the management of his king and the direction of his king all that he has all that he hopes for every enjoyment is there before the throne for God to do whatever he wants with and he longs for God's grace.

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So that he will never complain if God takes away things that he enjoys or brings hard times, but that he would trust him and even praise him through whatever comes.

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Yeah, there's a real sense of holding everything good even the best things in an open hand before the

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Lord and realizing that they come from him and if he is really who he is the all -knowing eternal all then for him to come and take things from the hand is good.

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And he said there's a desire not to close the hand around anything but he even says now look

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I dare not say that I'll never repine. I don't mean to say that when it hurts

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I won't sorrow for it yet. I hope I may say that I'll labor not only to submit but to acquiesce and to say, you know, whatever afflictions

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God brings into my life. They are brought by a God who whose wisdom knows that this is good.

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This is the best of all worlds. Yeah, that's not normally on a person's list of resolutions know that I resolve to embrace whatever choice

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God brings in my circumstances bitter or sweet. Yeah, and you know,

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I've heard it said I would not have chosen these hard times these afflictions, but were

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I an infinitely wise all -knowing and good God then

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I would have done exactly what happened because that's what happened. Yeah, so he continues use me.

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Oh Lord. I beseech thee as the instrument of thy Glory and honor me so far as either by doing or suffering thy appointments.

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I may bring praise to thy name and benefit to the world in which

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I live and may it please thee from this day forward to number me among my peculiar people that I may no longer be a stranger or foreigner, but a fellow citizen with the saints of the household of God.

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Again, as we mentioned earlier, he's not using this personal covenant to make a better William Grimshaw.

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These aren't New Year's resolutions so that the next year he would be more pleased with himself, but he longs for God to be glorified, but also that God would in his ministry that he would give him honor or reputation or influence only in so far as it does bring honor to God and does greater good to the people receive.

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Oh Heavenly Father being already washed in thy blood and clothed with thy righteousness me thy child and sanctify me throughout by the power of thy

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Holy Spirit destroy. I beseech thee more the power of sin in my heart transform me more into thine image and fashion me into the resemblance of Jesus whom

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I would henceforth ever acknowledge as my teacher and sacrifice my intercessor and my

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Lord. Communicate unto me. I beseech thee all needful influences of thy purifying cheering and comforting spirit and lift up that light of thy countenance upon me, which will put the sublimest joy and gladness into my heart.

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Notice the word more in that paragraph. I beseech thee destroy more of the power of sin transform me more into thy image, you know, so in this.

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Paragraph he's pleading that what God had begun in the work of conversion that he would continue in the work of sanctification and that's not a morose thing.

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He's not asking God to you know, put more weight on me so I can carry more for Jesus but by the work of the spirit that he would lift up the light of his countenance on him and he would bring him that sublimest joy and that gladness of heart.

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Yeah, praying for more and more of God, you know, did we receive the spirit when we first believed?

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Yes, we did. And did we repent when we first believed? Yes, we did. But do we continue to repent as we do and do we continue to pray for more of God and more of his spirit and more of God's influence in our in our life and our sanctification.

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We certainly do and I hope that's encouraging to you that there is there continued growth by continued working of the spirit in your life is always a possibility.

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It's always a very real possibility that we can pray for and expect God to answer dispose of my affairs.

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Oh God in a manner which may be wholly subservient to thy glory and my own true happiness and what

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I have done born and endured thy will upon Earth. Call me hence at what time and in what manner thou pleasest only grant that in my dying moments and the near approach of eternity.

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I may remember these my engagements to thee and may employ my latest breath in thy service and do thou when thou seest me in the agonies of death remember this covenant to though I should be incapable of recollecting it.

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Look down upon me O Lord thy languishing dying child place thine everlasting arms underneath my head put strength and confidence into my departing spirit and receive it to the embraces of thine everlasting love welcome it to the abodes of those who sleep in Jesus who are with him above to wait with them that glorious day when the last of thy promises to thy people shall be fulfilled in their triumphant resurrection and that abundant entrance which shall be administered unto them into that everlasting kingdom of which thou hast assured them by thy covenant in the hope of which

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I now lay hold of it desiring to live and die with my hand upon that hope.

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It's extraordinary in that we saw in that paragraph, but we're going to see and then in the following paragraph you're about to read that he includes death in this personal covenant.

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And this is certainly not a thing that you know, the American thinks of or you know, the Christian tends to think of when we think of resolutions.

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Okay, I look at last year and I see the kindness of Lord. I want to commit myself afresh. I'd like to put this down in a way that expresses, you know, a well -balanced summary of what

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I look to God for, what I want to give to God, but here he talks about death, that all the way to the end, my dying breath,

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I might remember this covenant and give my obedience to the last moment. But when

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I reach a place as my body feels that I can't remember the covenant, God, you remember the covenant and hold me all the way to the end.

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So a wonderful picture. And when I am thus numbered with the dead and all the interests of mortality are over with me forever, if this solemn memorial should fall into the hands of any surviving friends or relatives, may it be the means of making serious impressions upon their minds and may they read it not only as my language, but as their own and learn to fear the

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Lord, my God, and with me to put their trust under the shadow of his wings for time and for eternity.

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And may they also learn to adore with me that grace, which inclines our hearts to enter into the covenant and condescends to admit us into it when so inclined ascribing with me and with all the nations of the redeemed to the

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Father, Son, and Holy Ghost that glory and honor and praise, which is so justly due to each divine person for the part he bears in this illustrious work.

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Amen. So the last of the pleading here, he pleads that his death, even his death might be used by God as a means of making serious impressions upon the minds of those that he loves.

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And he mentions his relatives. He had a son at this time, if I remember Grimshaw's history correctly, that he was very concerned about the son's soul.

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The son was not a believer at this point. And he was yearning that God, he'd already lost his wife.

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He was yearning that God would, in mercy, work in the son in the same way that he had worked in William Grimshaw.

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So again, unique to read a personal covenant where you're pleading with God that at the end, not only would you help me to walk across that river of death, but that as I pass through those last moments, that you would use that to bring others to love you.

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Yeah, he says if this solemn memorial should fall into the hands of any surviving friends, he couldn't have imagined that here we are in the year 2018, about to be 2019, recording a podcast, reading this reprinted in a book by the

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Banner of Truth. So in God's good providence, it has fallen into the hands of some surviving friends.

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And it is our desire and our hope that those of you who are listening or watching that we will learn to adore with Grimshaw that grace which inclines his heart to enter into this covenant in the first place.

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It's amazing to see God's intention. I mean Grimshaw just couldn't have imagined it.

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And whatever God intends to do with you, I mean, we're not William Grimshaw.

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We're not going to be remembered by, you know, church history hundreds of years from now.

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But in God's providence, his use of these kinds of things to spur those that we love and even those that our own covenants may fall into the hands of one day is truly fascinating.

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He finishes by saying, I solemnly subscribe this dedication of myself to the forever blessed triune

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God in the presence of angels and all the invisible spectators this fourth day of December, 1752,

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William Grimshaw, minister of Haworth. Well, we've read through that and it might be kind of hard to follow in the podcast, but I think maybe we could kind of summarize some key things about that and especially how that's different from what we tend to think of as New Year's resolutions.

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One thing is that in this covenant, Grimshaw doesn't include all the Bible verses.

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Philip Doddridge does. Philip Doddridge throughout the covenant that this is just really a, he just plagiarized it.

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He puts throughout the entire covenant all the verses that are behind the pleadings, the hopes, and the promises of consecration.

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But for the sake of time, Grimshaw just doesn't include it in his journal there. So if you want to see the passages that are behind all these things, like we said, the things that validate it,

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I'm just coming to God with what you said, God. You can go back and find the Rise and Progress of Religion in the

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Soul by Philip Doddridge and turn to the back and hopefully the modern copies will also contain that. But another thing about this is that unlike our normal New Year's resolutions, as we mentioned, half of this is

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Grimshaw coming to God and strengthening his own faith by laying before the

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Lord the realities of God's covenant of grace and that this is the only hope that Grimshaw has of ever living another day for Christ.

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And also, as we mentioned, the whole issue of pleading about his coming death, to live with eternity in front of you.

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You know, I cannot imagine making a New Year's resolution for John Snyder that says, and Lord, you know that I'm 49 years old now and in 2019,

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God willing, I'll live long enough to be 50, but I may not and you may call me. And so if it's your choice that my body begin to fail, then

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I want until the last moment where my mind is clear and my body has strength, I want to devote that last word, that last act, that last thought to you.

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And please, God, if 2019 is the last year that John walks on this earth, please use it so that the people that I love would love you better.

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I mean, it's just not on our radar, but for the modern American, for the modern

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Christian, very helpful to consider that eternity ought to be before us in the coming year.

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Well, in the presence of angels and all the invisible spectators, we're going to bring this podcast to a close.

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Thanks for listening. This is the end of the main podcast.

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We're going to stop now and record a little bit for our supporter appreciation podcast.

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We're going to talk this week about some examples from some personal covenants that John has made over the years, ways that that has been helpful.

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I think just before the work here started at the church, there was some covenanting and to look back.

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And so if you're interested in that, you can click on the supporter appreciation podcast here on our blog.

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We do these additional podcasts each week as a way to just sort of tangibly say thank you to all of those of you who have come alongside of us with monthly support that enable us to do the podcast, but also to do the larger studies and projects that we that we do as Media Grazie.

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We don't ever want finances to be a barrier from someone who's interested in seeing and hearing those things and the things themselves.

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So if that's you, do get in touch with us at info at Media Grazie dot org. There's a contact form at our website, which in English is the means of grace dot org or Media Grazie dot org.

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They both go to the same place. So please feel free to use that contact form get in touch with us.

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We'll make sure you have access to that. If you're interested in becoming a monthly supporter, there's also a very easy to find way to do that at Media Grazie dot org.

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Thanks again for listening. We hope that this has been a blessing and an encouragement to you. We'd again love to hear from you.

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If this is something that you do if it's something that you have done and found to be beneficial in the past or if you have any questions about it get in touch.

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We'd love to hear from you. We'd love to address those things in future supporter appreciation podcasts.

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Well a slight change of plans. We'd intended to record supporter appreciation podcast on personal covenant that John made back in the late 90s just before the start of the work here at Christ Church, New Albany and certainly before any of the work with Media Grazie began that went long and was so good that we felt like we should just use that as our next week's podcast.

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So personal covenants part 2 that will be available next week. We do like to create a supporter appreciation podcast each week as a tangible way of saying thanks to those of you who have come alongside

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Media Grazie with your personal support with conference season upon us.

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We'll be going to conferences like the G3 conference the Bethlehem pastors conference possibly the

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Ligonier conference Shepherds out in Los Angeles and several others.

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We have a lot of major production projects with Media Grazie coming up for 2019 as well that will involve some travel travel around.

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Well, I don't want to give up too much of it now, but we'll be creating a lot of behind -the -scenes content that will give in addition to the supporter appreciation podcast for those of you guys who again who have who show your support in tangible ways each month.

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So be on a lookout for that. But this week because our supporter appreciation podcast turned into a podcast in its own right.

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There's not going to be a supporter appreciation podcast. So we do appreciate you but we ask that you would join us next week to hear the conclusion the part 2 of personal covenants.