The Good Shepherd Is Not to Be Spiritualized

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep.
John 10:10-15

The Gospel context and the cultural intertexts show that Jesus' use of the good shepherd image contests the leadership of those who administer the imperial system. The image is not to be spiritualized, as Kanagaraj does in claiming that the bad shepherds "steal people away from the path of obedience to Christ possibly by offering wrong teaching and theology." It is not primarily a matter of teaching and theology but rather societal injustice and exploitative leadership practices. These leaders cannot be good shepherds because they rule to benefit themselves materially and harm the people materially. No matter what they claim, they do not provide life and are not willing to give their lives for the life of society. They steal food, shelter, clothing, health, and safety from the people. They are illegitimate and violent rulers. Jesus-believers in Ephesus, urges the Gospel, cannot follow such violent "strangers." Violence is forbidden to Jesus' followers (John 18:36). They must "flee from" them and follow the good shepherd, whose voice they know (John 10:4-5). Happy accommodation with a thieving, illegitimate, violent, destructive, and life-threatening imperial system is not possible. They are called to an alternative allegiance in an antisociety, with a different set of practices. The title "good shepherd" as a descriptor of Jesus in contrast to imperial and allied leaders forms part of the Gospel's rhetoric of distance.

--Warren Carter, John and Empire: Initial Explorations, p.187-188

Red and Yellow, Black and White...

...they are precious in His sight.

Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods. But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more?
Galatians 4:8-9

Beware Over-Spiritualizing the Cross

Then Jesus told his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me."
Matthew 16:24

The cross utilizes a political image of shame, humiliation, pain, social rejection, marginalization, condemnation, and death. Crucifixion, as employed by Rome, was a cruel means of execution (Tacitus, Ann 15.44.4; Seneca, De Ira 1.2.2; Josephus, JW 7.203 [“ most pitiable of deaths”]). It was not used for Roman citizens (Cicero, Pro Rabirio 9-17, except for treason), but for sociopolitical marginals such as “rebellious” foreigners (Josephus, JW 2.306, 308; 5.449-53; Philo, In Flaccum 72, 84), violent criminals and robbers (Martial, On the Spectacles 9), and slaves (Cicero, In Verr 2.5.162; Juvenal, Sat 6.219-224; Tacitus, Ann 13.32.1). Crucifixion in public places was intended to deter noncompliant behavior (Josephus, JW 5.550). Carrying the cross-beam (patibulum) to the place of execution could be part of the precrucifixion torture and humiliation (Plutarch, “On the Delay of Divine Vengeance,” Moralia 554B). For some Jews, crucifixion could be associated with the curse on those hung on a tree (Deut 23: 21;
Gal 3: 13; 11QTemple 64: 6-13).

Jesus' scandalous call, then, to take up the cross and follow (cf. 4: 18-22) is a call to martyrdom, to die as Jesus does (9: 15; 10: 4, 21, 28, 29; 16: 21). Such is the risk of continuing Jesus' countercultural work of proclaiming and demonstrating God's empire (10: 7-8). On another level, it is a call to a life of marginalization, to identify with the nobodies like slaves, foreigners, criminals, and those understood to be cursed by God. It is also to identify with those who resist the empire's control, who contest its version of reality, and who are vulnerable to its reprisals. It is to identify with a sign of the empire's violent and humiliating attempt to dispose of all who threaten or challenge its interests. To so identify is not to endorse the symbol but to counter and reframe its violence. As the end of the gospel shows, it is to identify with a sign that ironically indicates the empire's limits. The empire does its worst in crucifying Jesus. But God raises Jesus from death to thwart the empire's efforts and to reveal the limits of its power.

--Carter, Warren. Matthew and the Margins: A Sociopolitical and Religious Reading (Bible and Liberation) (Kindle Locations 10421-10439). Orbis Books. Kindle Edition.

Corrupting the Well-Adjusted in a Sick Society

He told them another parable. “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven that a woman took and hid in three measures of flour, till it was all leavened.
Matthew 13:33

The small beginning effects a massive impact. The yeast/ leaven has worked quietly, invisibly, hidden away, over time. Rome and the religious elite do not see it at all. Disciples could wonder if it was there at all, or achieving anything. But inevitably all of it was leavened. The passive indicates God's action. The yeast/ leaven has done corrupting work in transforming the flour.

By comparison, God's reign works over time. In a similar way, it attacks the status quo. In doing transformative work, it shows that conventional life under imperial rule is unacceptable. God's ways are not human ways. God's empire is not the same as oppressive political, socioeconomic, and religious control. So Jesus heals the sick, casts out demons, eats with tax collectors and sinners, urges mercy, promotes access to shared resources, and constitutes alternative households. This is corrupting work in relation to the empire's status quo because it replaces an unjust hierarchical system which furthers the interests of the elite at the expense of the rest. But if a person is well adjusted in a sick society, corrupting is the only path to wholeness. In such a context, to be corrupted is to be transformed, saved, in encountering God's empire, in anticipation of its eventual completion in establishing God's life-giving reign over all things.

--Carter, Warren. Matthew and the Margins: A Sociopolitical and Religious Reading (Bible and Liberation) (Kindle Locations 8914-8924). Orbis Books. Kindle Edition.

Self: The Whole Evil of the Fallen Nature

Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
Matthew 16:24

“We need to know two things: (1) Our salvation consists wholly in being saved from ourselves, or that which we are by nature; (2) In the whole nature of things, nothing could be salvation or savior to us but the humility of God beyond all expression. Hence the first unalterable term of ‘Savior’ of fallen man: ‘Except a man deny himself he cannot be my disciple.’ Self is the whole evil of the fallen nature. Self-denial is our capacity for being saved. Humility is our savior.... Self is the root, the branches, the tree, of all the evil of our fallen state. All the evil of fallen angels and of men has its birth in the pride of self. On the other hand, all the virtues of the heavenly life stem from humility. It is humility alone that makes the impassable gulf between heaven and hell. What is then, or in what lies, the great struggle for eternal life? It all lies in the strife between pride and humility. Pride and humility are the two master powers, the two kingdoms at war for the eternal possession of man. There never was or ever will be but one humility, and that is the humility of Christ. Pride and self have the “all” of man, until man has his all in Christ. He only fights the good fight whose desire is that the self-idolatrous nature that he has from Adam may be put to death by the supernatural humility of Christ brought to life in him.” Adapted from William Law, Address to the Clergy, n.d., 52.

--Murray, Andrew. Humility: The Journey Toward Holiness (Kindle Locations 865-875). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

The Bible is Alive!

Traditional apologists tell us the Bible must be tested to prove that it is true. Biblical apologetics says we use the Bible to test all things to see if they are true. Traditionalists tell us the laws of logic are absolute; God says His Word is absolute (Psalm 119: 89). Traditionalists tell us that we cannot know truth with certainty; God tells us we can know truth with certitude as we search the Scriptures (1 John 5: 13). Sproul says logic is preeminent, God says His Word is preeminent (Psalm 138: 2). Craig says Scripture’s authority is secondary and “derivative”; God says Scripture’s authority is primary and inherent and that they are the very breath of God (2 Timothy 3: 16), the very incarnation of God’s thoughts and will. Traditionalists tell us the Bible must pass the test of historiography; God says His Word determines history, and the future (Isaiah 46: 8-11). Traditionalists tell us the Bible stands on equal footing with all other literature to be tested; God says His Word is eternal! (Psalm 19: 9)

Traditionalists tell us that unbelievers must first accept the Bible before it does its work; God says Scripture does its work despite human resistance and ignorance for it is living and active. Scripture is dynamically creating (Psalm 33: 6), convicting (James 2: 9), judging (Hebrews 4: 12), piercing (Hebrews 4: 12), being feared (Exodus 9: 20), being fulfilled (Isaiah 55: 11), being obeyed (Psalm 103: 20), saving (1 Peter 1: 23), sanctifying (Psalm 105: 19; 119: 9), residing in believers (Psalm 119: 11), healing (Psalm 107: 20), illuminating (Psalm 119: 18), counseling (Psalm 119: 24), feeding (Isaiah 55: 1-3), reviving (Psalm 119: 50), sustaining (Psalm 119: 116), guiding (Psalm 119), consoling (Psalm 119: 28), imparting joy (Psalm 119: 35), and teaching (Psalm 119: 71). The Bible is alive!

--Clifford B. McManis. Biblical Apologetics: Advancing and Defending the Gospel of Christ (Kindle Locations 2742-2755). 9781483623498. Kindle Edition.

Human Government and the Kingdoms of the World

And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever, just as you saw that a stone was cut from a mountain by no human hand, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold. A great God has made known to the king what shall be after this. The dream is certain, and its interpretation sure.”
Daniel 2:44-45

None can doubt that the final end will be the destruction of all earthly kingdoms, that they may give place to the reign of the Divine kingdom.  How can this be when the children of the Divine kingdom give their lives to uphold the earthly kingdoms?  As things now go, every individual in the world might be converted to Christ and yet the earthly kingdoms would remain in all their present strength and vigor, and the spirit of the world would be cherished in the church of God.  But if every man converted to Christ withdrew from the support of the earthly kingdoms, these kingdoms would weaken and fall to pieces, for lack of supporters; "little by little" giving way before the increase and spread of the kingdom of God.  It would no more do to destroy them suddenly, lest the wild beasts of ruin and destruction and anarchy possess the land, than it would have done to suddenly destroy the inhabitants of Canaan on the advent of the children of Israel lest the wild beasts multiply in that land against the people of God.  God must in the police regulations of the world retain his institutions ordained to execute wrath until his own children possess the earth.


God has two processes continually going forward, by which the world is to become the possession of the "saints of the most high."

1. The work of conversion goes forward taking men, one by one, out of service of the earthly kingdoms and transferring them to the service of the Divine kingdom.
2. He uses one wicked nation, one earthly government to destroy another nation or people, hopelessly given over to sin and rebellion.

The compromises of the children of God with the human governments, that obtain now, thwart both these processes.

1. Conversion to Christ does not take the person out of the kingdoms of the evil one.  It does not weaken the kingdoms of this world.  It does not consecrate the talents, the means, the strength, the life of the converts to support and spread the kingdom of God.  It does not separate them from the kingdoms of the world, it does not bring them under the guidance of the kingdom of Christ.  Conversion to Christ now does not weaken the kingdoms of the devil.  It does not strengthen the church of God, but oftener, by bringing in an evil spirit, weakens it.
2. The children of God are so mixed and mingled with the kingdoms of the world, that God cannot destroy the wicked kingdoms, without destroying his own children.  Hence the call of God is: "Come out of her my people that ye be not partakers of her sins and that ye receive not her plagues" (Revelation 18:4).

This is spoken of the Babylon of human government.  We cannot find one word of ground, in all the New Testament, for the children of God participating in the kingdoms of the evil one.  The practice weakens the church of God; deprives it of the service, the talent, time and devotion of its children, gives it strength to the building up of what God proposes to destroy.  It brings the spirit of the world kingdoms into the church of God, corrupts the church, drives out the spirit of God, destroys the sense of dependence upon God, causes the children of God to depend upon their own wisdom and devices, and the arm of violence, and the institutions of earth rather than upon God and his appointments; weans them from trust and faith in God, and from service in his kingdom, diverts their minds, means and service from the church to the kingdoms of the world, and so defiles and corrupts the church that God cannot bless that church.

What the church needs now is a consecrated membership that will sanctify the man -- soul, mind and body -- to the service of God.  That will consecrate the talent, the time, the means of God's people to the service and advancement of God's kingdom; that will cause every Christian father and mother, like Hannah of old, to accept children as the gifts of the Lord, to be consecrated to his service from childhood.  Now the mothers and fathers in Christ, oftener than otherwise, object to their children devoting themselves to the service of God.  They prefer that they should do service and gain honor in the earthly governments.  It is all folly and delusion to think of converting the world to God, with the present affiliation between the church of God and the kingdoms of the devil, and this giving the means and service due the church, to strengthen and upbuild her enemy.  There can be no hope for the conversion of the world, until these two kingdoms be recognized in their true, antagonistic spirit, mission, and destiny.

--David Lipscomb, Civil Government: Its Origin, Mission, and Destiny, and the Christian's Relation To It, p. 81-83

Against Such Things There Is No Law

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.
Galatians 5:22-23

Paul, in 1 Corinthians 13, defines love as being kind. Is true love always kind? Yes. Can true love be anything other than kind? No. If you made a law that forbids kindness, would true love disobey that law and show kindness? Yes. That is precisely Paul's point in Galatians 5:22-23 as he describes the fruit of the Spirit and concludes that there are no (nor can there be) laws against these things. There are (and must be) laws against the desires of the flesh, but the nature of the desires of the Spirit precludes them from laws against them. Why is love always kind? Why must love be kind? Does the law and its just threats have anything at all to do with why love is kind? None at all! Love is kind just because it is the nature of love to be kind! True love does not need law in any sense. However, sinners need law to keep them from abusing love and turning it into lust. If we could desire, feel, and practice love as Paul describes it in 1 Corinthians 13, we could indeed "do as we please." Since that is impossible because of indwelling sin, we need clear objective standards describing love for us. We can know that love is the right thing to do, but we do not always know what is the loving thing to do. The Holy Spirit informs us through the Scripture, transforming us thereby so that we become more like Jesus, who always loved God with all his being and his neighbor as himself.

--John Reisinger, Studies in Galatians, p. 430

The Ministry of Death

[God] has made us ... ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit.  For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.  Now if the ministry of death, carved in letters on stone ... was being brought to an end...
2 Corinthians 3:6-7

To "hear" the law is to understand clearly the law's terms of perfect obedience and to realize you can never satisfy those terms and are therefore without hope of ever seeing, apart from sovereign electing grace, the face of God in peace.

It is tragic that neither the Judaizers in Paul's day nor many Christians today understand what it means to hear the law.  The Scriptures are replete with statements that a person can "hear" without ever "hearing" (Matt. 13:10-17).  This is true of the law as well as the gospel.  If all you ever heard was, "Thou shalt not steal," you have not heard the law.  All you heard was a commandment.  You have not heard the law until you hear it say, "Thou shalt not steal and if you do I will have you stoned to death."  Now you have heard the law.  If all you heard was, "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy," all you heard was a commandment.  If you heard, "Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy, and if you so much as pick up a few sticks you are a dead man," then you heard the law.  It is the penalty aspect that gives law its status and authority.  You could post a sign saying "50 mile-an-hour speed limit" every hundred yards on every highway in America, but without a fine for breaking that speed limit, police officers to arrest speeders, and judges to collect the fines, you do not have a law--you only have good advice.

In Galatians, Paul uses the term the law to refer to the old covenant in its entirety, including the Ten Commandments.  He states that this law cannot provide help in the fight against sin--either in justification or in sanctification.  The purpose of the old covenant was to expose sin and to drive a sinner to the only viable solution in the battle against sin--the Lord Jesus Christ.  To view the old covenant in any other ways is to misunderstand and misuse it.  The ultimate goal of the old covenant was to do its killing work job and then pass out of existence.

--John Reisinger, Studies in Galatians, p.283-284

What's Wrong with You People?!

Christ Is Dead for You

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die—but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. ... For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son...
Romans 5:6-8, 10

While we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.
While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
While we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son.

What conditions were met in us in order for God to send his only Son into the world to die for sinners?  None.  Indeed there can be none.  This is what [Thomas] Boston found valuable in the expression "Christ is dead for you."  For Boston meant this: "I do not offer Christ to you on the grounds that you have repented.  Indeed I offer him to men and women who are dead in their trespasses and sins.  This gospel offer of Jesus Christ himself is for you, whoever and whatever you are."

--Sinclair Ferguson, The Whole Christ: Legalism, Antinomianism, and Gospel Assurance—Why the Marrow Controversy Still Matters, page 65

Till You Feel this Same Power...

Be not overly righteous, and do not make yourself too wise. Why should you destroy yourself?
Ecclesiastes 7:16 

My dear brethren, I speak of these things, these innocent diversions, as the polite part of the world calls them, by experience; perhaps none, for my age, hath read or seen more plays than I have: I took delight in, and was pleased with them. It is true, I went to church frequently, received the sacrament, and was diligent in the use of the forms of religion, but I was all this while ignorant of the power of God on my heart, and unacquainted with the work of grace; but when God was pleased to shine with power upon my soul, I could no longer be contented to feed on husks, or what the swine die eating; the Bible then was my food; there, and there only I took delight: and till you feel this same power, you will not abstain from the earthly delights of this age, you will take no comfort in God’s ways, nor receive any comfort from him; for you are void of the love of God, having only the form of godliness, while you are denying the power of it; you are nominal Christians, when you have not the power of Christianity.

The polite gentlemen say, “Are we to be always upon our knees? Would you have us be always at prayer, and reading or hearing the word of God?” My dear brethren, the fashionable ones, who take delight in hunting, are not tired of being continually on horseback after their hounds; and when once you are renewed by the Spirit of God, it will be a continual pleasure to be walking with, and talking of God, and telling what great things Jesus Christ hath done for your souls; and till you can find as much pleasure in conversing with God, as these men do of their hounds, you have no share in him; but when you have tasted how good the Lord is, you will show forth his praise; out of the abundance of your heart your mouth will speak.

--Whitefield, G. (1999). Selected Sermons of George Whitefield. Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

The Lord Our Righteousness (Jehovah Tsidkenu)

In his days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is the name by which he will be called: 'The LORD is our righteousness.'
Jeremiah 23:6 

I once was a stranger to grace and to God,
I knew not my danger; and felt not my load;
Though friends spoke in rapture of Christ on the tree,
Jehovah Tsidkenu was nothing to me.

I oft read with pleasure, to soothe or engage,
Isaiah’s wild measure and John’s simple page;
But even when they pictured the blood-sprinkled tree,
Jehovah Tsidkenu seemed nothing to me.

Like tears from the daughters of Zion that roll,
I wept when the waters went over His soul,
Yet thought not that my sins had nailed to the tree
Jehovah Tsidkenu — ’twas nothing to me.

When free grace awoke me by light from on high,
Then legal fears shook me, I trembled to die;
No refuge, no safety in self could I see —
Jehovah Tsidkenu my Saviour must be.

My terrors all vanished before the sweet name;
My guilty fear banished, with boldness I came
To drink at the fountain, life-giving and free—
Jehovah Tsidkenu is all things to me.

Jehovah Tsidkenu! My treasure and boast,
Jehovah Tsidkenu! I ne’er can be lost;
In Thee shall I conquer by flood and by field—
My cable, my anchor, my breastplate and shield!

Even treading the valley; the shadow of death,
This “watchword” shall rally my faltering breath;
For when from life’s fever my God sets me free,
Jehovah Tsidkenu my death-song shall be.

--Robert Murray M'Cheyne

We Cannot Escape It

And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?
Matthew 6:27

The millionaire has no advantage over the most wretched pauper in existence.
...
Medical knowledge and skill cannot extend life.  We think they can, but that is because we do not know.  These things are all determined by God, and thus even medical men are often bewildered and frustrated.  Two patients who appear to be in the same condition are given identical treatment.  One recovers; the other dies.  What is the answer?  The answer is that 'no man can add one cubit to his duration of life'.  It is a great mystery, but we cannot escape it.  Our times are in the hands of God, and do what we will, with all our food and drink, and our medical profession, and all our learning and science and skill, we cannot add a fraction to the duration of man's life.  In spite of all modern advances in knowledge, our times are still in the hands of God.  And so, our Lord argues, why all the fuss and bother, why all the excitement, why all this worry and anxiety?  Life is a gift from God.  He starts it and He determines the end of it.  He sustains it, and we are in His hands.  Therefore, when you tend to become worried and anxious, just pull yourself up at once and say, I cannot start, or continue or end life; all this is entirely in His hands.  If that greater thing is there in His control, I can leave the lesser also to Him.  You cannot extend your life even by one cubit; therefore recognize the utter futility and waste of time and energy involved in worrying about these things.  Do your work; sow, reap and gather into barns; but remember that the remainder is in the hands of God.  You may have the finest seed you can buy on the market; you may have the best plough and everything necessary in the sowing; but if God withheld the sun and the rain you would not have a crop.  God is ultimately behind it all.  Man has his place and his work, but it is God that giveth the increase.  This is what we must always remember, and it applies always and in all circumstances.

--Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, p.391-392

David, after he had served the purpose of God in his own generation, fell asleep and was laid with his fathers and saw corruption.
Acts 13:36

We Often Spoil Our Appetite...

... for righteousness.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
Matthew 5:6

I suggest that if we are truly hungering and thirsting after righteousness we shall not only avoid things that we know to be bad and harmful, we shall even avoid things that tend to

dull or take the edge off our spiritual appetites. There are so many things like that, things that are quite harmless in themselves and which are perfectly legitimate. Yet if you find that you are spending much of your time with them, and that you desire the things of God less, you must avoid them. This question of appetite is a very delicate one. We all know how, in the physical sense, we can easily spoil our appetite, dull its edge, so to speak, by eating things between meals. Now it is like that in the spiritual realm. There are so many things that I cannot condemn in and of themselves. But if I find I spend too much of my time with them, and that somehow I want God and spiritual things less and less, if I am hungering and thirsting after righteousness, I shall avoid them.

--Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, p.76

Should It Really Surprise Us?

And God said to Abraham, "As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name. I will bless her, and moreover, I will give you a son by her. I will bless her, and she shall become nations; kings of people shall come from her." Then Abraham fell on his face and laughed and said to himself, "Shall a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Shall Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?"
Genesis 17:15-17

The following is an imaginative reflection of part of what Abraham might have said to Sarah after this encounter with the Lord.

I know, Sarah. We are powerless to have children, now more than ever. But if we've learned anything these twenty-five years, it's that our hope doesn't rest on our power to do anything. Our hope rests on the Lord's power. Our entire lives are built on what he's promised. And the lives of our descendants must be built on his promises for generations before they ever occupy this land. Their survival will depend on them trusting the Lord's promises and not their own power. Should it really surprise us that the first descendant the Lord gives us is a reminder of this?
--Jon Bloom, Things Not Seen: A Fresh Look at Old Stories of Trusting God's Promises

As those living on this side of history, it shouldn't surprise us. Through all their waiting and believing against hope (Romans 4:18), God was forging in Abraham and Sarah the faith that they would bequeath to their descendants ... including us.

When God wants to drill a man,
And thrill a man,
And skill a man
When God wants to mold a man
To play the noblest part;

When He yearns with all His heart
To create so great and bold a man
That all the world shall be amazed,
Watch His methods, watch His ways!

How He ruthlessly perfects
Whom He royally elects!
How He hammers him and hurts him,
And with mighty blows converts him

Into trial shapes of clay which
Only God understands;
While his tortured heart is crying
And he lifts beseeching hands!

How He bends but never breaks
When his good He undertakes;
How He uses whom He chooses,
And which every purpose fuses him;
By every act induces him
To try His splendor out-
God knows what He’s about.

– Anonymous

He knows what He's about.

Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham.
Galatians 3:7

Fruit Becoming the Vineyard of God

And he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it and found none.
Luke 13:6

The Lord expects fruit becoming the vineyard of God. ‘The vineyard,’ saith he, ‘in a very fruitful hill’: witness the fruit brought forth in all ages (Isa 5:1). The most barren trees that ever grew in the wood of this world, when planted in this vineyard by the God of heaven, what fruit to Godward have they brought forth! ‘Abel offered the more excellent sacrifice’ (Heb 11:4). Enoch walked with God three hundred years (Heb 11:5). Noah, by his life of faith, ‘condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith’ (Heb 11:7). Abraham left his country, and went out after God, not knowing whither he went (Heb 11:8). Moses left a kingdom, and run the hazard of the wrath of the king, for the love he had to God and Christ. What shall I say of them who had trials, ‘not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection? They were stoned; they were sawn asunder; were tempted; were slain with the sword; they wandered about in sheep-skins and goat-skins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented’ (Heb 11:35-37). Peter left his father, ship, and nets (Matt 4:18-20). Paul turned off from the feet of Gamaliel. Men brought their goods and possessions (the price of them) and cast it down at the apostle’s feet (Acts 19:18-20). And others brought their books together, and burned them; curious books, though they were worth fifty thousand pieces of silver. I could add how many willingly offered themselves in all ages, and their all, for the worthy name of the Lord Jesus, to be racked, starved, hanged, burned, drowned, pulled in pieces, and a thousand calamities. Barren figtree, the vineyard of God hath been a fruitful place. What dost thou there? What dost thou bear? God expects fruit according to, or becoming the soil of the vineyard.

--John Bunyan, The Barren Fig Tree, p.13-14

What dost thou there? What dost thou bear?

No Pain, No Gain

For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained [Greek = gymnazo --> gymnasium] by it.
Hebrews 12:11

God, says this man, by doing the things that He is doing to you, is as it were putting you
into that spiritual gymnasium. He has you stripped, He is examining you, He knows exactly what you need. Now all you have to do is to submit to Him and do exactly what He tells you. Listen to the Instructor, go through the exercises, and if you do so it will give you 'the peaceable fruit of righteousness'. What does all this mean? Being interpreted it means this. The first thing we have to do is to examine ourselves and submit ourselves to the examination of God's Word. The moment any untoward [= unfavorable] event happens to us we must say: 'I am in the gymnasium. Something must be the matter. What has been going wrong? Where is my trouble?' That is the way the Christian should always react to any one of these things that happen. Is it illness, is it accident, is it a failure, is it a disappointment, is it someone's death? I do not care what it is, but on the basis of this teaching, the first thing I should say to myself is: 'Why has this happened to me, have I been going astray somewhere?' Read Psalm 119 and you will find the Psalmist says: 'It is good for me that I have been afflicted...' (Psalm 119:71) Before I was afflicted I went astray: but now have I kept Thy word' (Psalm 119:67). He had not realized that he had been slipping away but his affliction makes him think, and he says: 'I thank God for this, it is a good thing for me, I am a better man for it: I was going astray'. Therefore you and I should always in the first instance examine ourselves, and ask: 'Have I been negligent in my spiritual life, have I been forgetting God, have I become somewhat elated and self-satisfied, have I sinned, have I done any wrong?' We must examine ourselves, we try to discover the cause, we do it thoroughly. None of this as this man tells us is 'joyous', but we must search our life and examine ourselves to the very depths, however painful it may be, to see if there is some respect in which we have been going astray without our knowing it. We must face it honestly.

--Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Cure, p. 255-256

The Good Life

In the West we have not the slightest inkling that, in reveling in affluence as we do, we are playing with fire.  This affluence so easily becomes an alternative Way, Truth, and Life, a counterfeit gospel in which to have is to be saved and to have not is to be damned.  Unfortunately, la dolce vita [= the sweet life, the good life] is not itself satisfying, not in an enduring way.  It tends to make us shallow, self-absorbed people who give ourselves to chasing what is superficial by way of styles, fads, and what is pleasurable provided there are no demands for commitments.  The styles quickly become obsolete, the fads are forgotten, and the pleasures fade like the morning mist so that this kind of life constantly has to be reinventing itself.  Those who fashion their lives around these things die of emptiness.  The pains that linger in the soul like a bad headache stay a long, long time.

It is hard to know exactly how those who have received the Word stand in relation to Christ, but they show nothing of spiritual merit in their lives despite their hearing of the Word, their born-again profession, and maybe their churchgoing.  They may show up in the born-again category in Barna's polls, but they are not in the right category in life.

--David Wells, The Courage to Be Protestant: Truth-lover, Marketers, and Emergents in the Postmodern World, p.90

On the contrary:

You make known to me the path of life;
in your presence there is fullness of joy;
at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.
Psalm 16:11

An Absolute Certainty

If I crave happiness, I will receive misery. If I crave to be loved, I will receive rejection. If I crave significance, I will receive futility. If I crave control, I will receive chaos. If I crave reputation, I will receive humiliation. But if I long for God and his wisdom and mercy, I will receive God and wisdom and mercy. Along the way, sooner or later, I will also receive happiness, love, meaning, order, and glory.
--David Powlison, Seeing with New Eyes: Counseling and the Human Condition Through the Lens of Scripture, p. 161

In other words, the good news:

I say to the Lord, "You are my Lord;
I have no good apart from you."
Psalm 16:2

And the bad news:

The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply;
Psalm 16:4