Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 340-341 | Adicionado em sábado, 29 de novembro de 2014 10:08:31

point should be made about divine beauty: God is the only place true beauty is found. There simply is nowhere else and no one else who has it. All true beauty in the universe is found either in
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 340-341 | Adicionado em sábado, 29 de novembro de 2014 10:08:37

point should be made about divine beauty: God is the only place true beauty is found. There simply is nowhere else and no one else who has it. All true beauty in the universe is found either in God himself or in the direct reflection of God.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 632-636 | Adicionado em domingo, 30 de novembro de 2014 17:47:43

But in essence the beginning of the Christian life is a sovereignly granted explosion of new life, a change so radical, carrying with it such a break with the past, that it is nothing less than a second birth. In the new birth we are, for the first time, alive to beauty. This is unsettling to us, even frightening, because it rests solely in the hands of God. Yet it is refreshingly liberating too, because it affirms what our hearts know: true and lasting transformation cannot come from any humanly wrought strategies or efforts. We can’t change ourselves.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 651-653 | Adicionado em domingo, 30 de novembro de 2014 17:49:54

New Birth Is Necessary It is “absolutely necessary for everyone,” says Edwards, “that he be regenerated, or born again.”
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 666-667 | Adicionado em domingo, 30 de novembro de 2014 17:53:15

The great distinction between sinners is not between those who need new birth and those who do not, for all need it; the great distinction is between those who know they need it and those who do not. Jesus
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 668-669 | Adicionado em domingo, 30 de novembro de 2014 17:53:35

New Birth Changes Us
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 700-700 | Adicionado em domingo, 30 de novembro de 2014 23:29:42

New Birth Is Completely a Work of God
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 734-735 | Adicionado em domingo, 30 de novembro de 2014 23:35:31

New Birth Does Not Perfect Us
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 732-733 | Adicionado em domingo, 30 de novembro de 2014 23:35:50

It was God and God alone who gave us new life, and it is God and God alone who will sustain us in that new life. Those who have been given new birth “are a soil in which this heavenly seed has been sown and in which it abides.”
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 743-744 | Adicionado em domingo, 30 de novembro de 2014 23:37:33

Edwards goes on to explain that it is not the absence of sin that is the key mark of regeneration but the hatred of it.28 Sin dwells, but no longer reigns, in believers.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 751-751 | Adicionado em domingo, 30 de novembro de 2014 23:38:28

New Birth Is the Source of Real Joy
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 806-808 | Adicionado em segunda-feira, 1 de dezembro de 2014 00:14:14

The purpose of regeneration is to make us spiritual people, those who live and walk by the Spirit. This life is a life of intimate communion with God in Christ. Though believers are made new creatures in Christ, this does not mean that their created nature is qualitatively transformed.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 808-810 | Adicionado em segunda-feira, 1 de dezembro de 2014 00:14:21

Believers remain fully human, fully created image-bearers of God as in the beginning. As in creation itself, no new substance enters into the world with redemption; the creature is liberated from sin’s futility and bondage. Sin is not of the essence of creation but its deformity; Christ is not a second Creator but creation’s Redeemer. Salvation is the restoration of creation and the reformation of life.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 1103-1103 | Adicionado em segunda-feira, 1 de dezembro de 2014 00:34:01

Love Sums Up the Entire Christian Life
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 1102-1102 | Adicionado em segunda-feira, 1 de dezembro de 2014 00:34:05

We move, then, to considering seven core axioms that draw out Edwards’s magnificent vision of love in the Christian life.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 1106-1107 | Adicionado em segunda-feira, 1 de dezembro de 2014 00:34:22

“the greatest and most essential thing, and indeed the sum of all that is essential, distinguishing and saving in Christianity, and . . . the very life and soul of all religion.”
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 1137-1137 | Adicionado em segunda-feira, 1 de dezembro de 2014 07:48:41

Christian Love Lies beneath Every Other Virtue
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 1237-1241 | Adicionado em segunda-feira, 1 de dezembro de 2014 11:33:09

He who loves money is influenced by his love of that enjoyment in his practice, and kept in continual pursuit of it. And he who loves honor is governed in his practice by that. His actions through the course of his life are regulated by such a principle. And so lovers of carnal pleasures; how they pursue after them in their practice! And so also he who truly loves God is influenced by that in his practice; he earnestly seeks God in the course of his life, seeks his favor and acceptance, and seeks his glory.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 1271-1272 | Adicionado em segunda-feira, 1 de dezembro de 2014 11:36:32

Love without truth is rootless. Truth without love is lifeless. Neither is true Christianity.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu marcador ou posição 1333 | Adicionado em terça-feira, 2 de dezembro de 2014 00:20:30


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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 1602-1603 | Adicionado: quarta-feira, 3 de dezembro de 2014 00:38:34

The Father is the sun itself, the Son is the brightness of the sun, and the Spirit is the warmth of the sun.12
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 1740-1744 | Adicionado: sexta-feira, 5 de dezembro de 2014 02:27:51

And at that glorious appearing of the great God, and our Savior Jesus Christ, shall the whole elect church, complete as to every individual member and each member with the whole man, both body and soul, and both in perfect glory, ascend up to meet the Lord in the air, to be thenceforth forever with the Lord. That will be a joyful meeting of this glorious bridegroom and bride indeed. Then the bridegroom will appear in all his glory without any veil: and then the saints shall shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father, and at the right hand of their Redeemer.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu marcador ou posição 1874 | Adicionado: sexta-feira, 5 de dezembro de 2014 02:33:26


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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 2334-2335 | Adicionado: terça-feira, 9 de dezembro de 2014 02:17:15

“Show me the condition of your Bible,” wrote A. W. Tozer, “and I will accurately predict the condition of your soul.”
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 2473-2474 | Adicionado: terça-feira, 9 de dezembro de 2014 02:29:34

Prayer is God the Holy Spirit bringing us to commune with God the Father through God the Son. Far
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 2497-2499 | Adicionado: terça-feira, 9 de dezembro de 2014 02:34:40

But Edwards saw the vastly greater significance of what is happening to us on the inside versus what is happening to us on the outside, and the strange way we tend to treat the two in inverse proportion to their eternal significance when we pray.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 2891-2893 | Adicionado: sexta-feira, 12 de dezembro de 2014 01:45:03

All these church leaders of the past have pointed out that there are not two ways to live (obedient and disobedient) but three: disobedient, sullenly obedient, and joyfully obedient. And, of course, since we are commanded to obey joyfully, sullen obedience is in fact disobedience.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 2896-2897 | Adicionado: sexta-feira, 12 de dezembro de 2014 02:03:38

real obedience is living out of a new sense of the heart, in which God and holiness now appear beautiful rather than ugly.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 2929-2930 | Adicionado: sexta-feira, 12 de dezembro de 2014 02:09:34

Obedience is fruit, not root. Obedience Is Required
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu marcador ou posição 3050 | Adicionado: sexta-feira, 12 de dezembro de 2014 22:56:56


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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 3077-3078 | Adicionado: sábado, 13 de dezembro de 2014 01:22:13

Both sin and obedience consist in doing what we want to do. What makes the difference is whether we are alive to the beauty of God or not.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 3095-3095 | Adicionado: sábado, 13 de dezembro de 2014 01:26:16

Real obedience is freely doing what we now love to do, not forcing our wills to do something we are loathe to do.
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Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God (Theologians on the Christian Life) (Ortlund, Dane C.)
- Seu destaque ou posição 3645-3662 | Adicionado: sábado, 13 de dezembro de 2014 21:03:46

Edwards makes five points. First, heaven is a world of love because God is there. “Heaven is the palace, or presence-chamber, of the Supreme Being who is both the cause and source of all holy love.”8 The point is not that heaven is a lovely place and God is there too; heaven is lovely because God is there. Because God is “a full and overflowing and an inexhaustible fountain of love,” God fills heaven with love the same way the sun fills a cloudless day with light. Second, there is nothing unlovely there, and everything in this world that is a mixture of loveliness and unloveliness will be purged of the unloveliness so that only what is beautiful and pure remains.9 Third, moving from the objects of heavenly love to its subjects, the love that is in heaven pours forth from God himself, especially to his own dear Son and then also to the saints.10 Believers are caught up into the never-ending, calm explosion of love transpiring between the Father and the Son, love that is itself the Holy Spirit.11 Edwards then, fourth, considers the love itself.12 Here we find some of the most beautiful reflection on heaven the church has ever been given. Edwards explains that while the saints will have different degrees of glory, this will be no problem—for heaven is a world of love. Those in lower places in glory will not envy those in higher places, but due to their perfect love those in lower stations will actually be perfectly delighted on behalf of those above them. They would have it no other way. And those above them will know no condescension, because they too will be perfectly full of love, looking with exquisite joyous delight on those in lower stations. The beauty of this confounds us because we do not have a category for such a sin-free delight in one another. Yet this love for one another is what makes heaven heaven. Fifth and finally, Edwards reflects on the “circumstances in which love shall be expressed and enjoyed”—such as the way in which perfect love is always mutual: the saints expressing their love for Christ to their hearts’ content, and Christ

Finally, there are a number of very obviously Messianic Psalms that give us particularly rich views of Christ. They include the following: the enthroned Messiah (Ps 2, 110), the rejected Messiah (Ps 118), the betrayed Messiah (Ps 69, 109), the dying and rising Messiah (Ps 22, 16), the heavenly bridegroom of his people (Ps 45), and the triumphant Messiah (Ps 68, 72).383 These are opportunities to simply consider the greatness and beauty of Jesus, to adore and rest in him.

Simply Jesus: A New Vision of Who He Was, What He Did, and Why He Matters (Wright, N. T.)

Timothy Keller: Prayer: Experiencing Awe and Intimacy with God

Prayer: Experiencing Awe and Intimacy with God de Tim Keller

Tim Keller hoje é um dos mais influentes líderes e pensadores evangélicos de nosso tempo. Depois de escrever sobre diversos assuntos, ele escreveu um livro sobre oração. 

O livro pode ser visto como uma resposta aos críticos mais tradicionais reformados que criticam sua aproximação com autores contemplativos.

Algumas notas:

"Cristo não é parte da alegria do céu: toda a alegria do universo é uma parte de Cristo"

"Talvez oramos pela vinda do reino de Deus, mas se não desfrutamos de Deus com todo o nosso ser, não honramos a Ele como Senhor"

"Deus é a única pessoa de quem não podemos esconder ada. Diante dele, você  inevitavelmente vê a si mesmo numa nova, única luz. Oração, então, leva a um auto-conhecimento que é impossível de encontrar em outro lugar"

"É necessário para nós reconhece que há um misticismo inteligente na vida da fé...da vida de união e comunhão com o exaltado e sempre presente Redentor. Ele comunga com seu povo e seu povo comuga com ele num amor consciente recíproco. A vida da verdadeira fé não pode ser um assento metálico frio. Deve ter a paixão e o calor do amor e da comunhão, porque a comunhão com Deus é a coração e o ápice da verdadeira religião."

"Se você não é feliz, humilde e fiel em privado diante Deus, então o que você quer aparecer para fora não combina com quem você realmente é"

"Nós devemos primeiro ouvir a Palavra, e então o Espírito Santo trabalha em nossos corações: ele trabalha nos corações de quem ele quer, como ele quer, mas nunca sem a Palavra"

"A Bíblia não nos apresenta uma arte de oração, ela apresenta o Deus da oração"

"Em nosso estado natural, oramos para Deus para ter coisas"

"As boas coisas que não pedimos são usualmente interpretadas por nossos corações como frutos de nossa própria sabedoria e diligência. Dons de Deus que não são percebidos como tais são mortais para alma porque eles reforçam a ilusão da auto-suficiência  que leva a uma confiança exagerada e nos põe a falência"

"Orar em nome Jesus significa que vamos a Deus em oração confiança conscientemente em Cristo para a nossa salvação e aceitação e não descansando em nossa própria credibilidade ou histórico. Isto é essencialmente, redefinir nossa relação com Deus na obra salvífica de Jesus uma e outra vez. Isto também significa reconhecer a nossa posição como crianças de Deus, independentemente do nosso estado interior. Deus, o nosso Pai está comprometido com o bem da criança como qualquer pai deveria estar"

"Toda oração é de alguma forma impura. Nunca é feita com os motivos próprios do coração ou com a linguagem digna de seu objeto. Ela é recebida e respondida por Deus, contudo, apenas pela graça"

"O real arrependimento deve ter dois componentes: admitir e rejeitar"

Imagine an eight-year-old boy playing with a toy truck and then it breaks. He is disconsolate and cries out to his parents to fix it. Yet as he’s crying, his father says to him, “A distant relative you’ve never met has just died and left you one hundred million dollars.” What will the child’s reaction be? He will just cry louder until his truck is fixed. He does not have enough cognitive capacity to realize his true condition and be consoled. In the same way, Christians lack the spiritual capacity to realize all we have in Jesus.

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if we aim to move beyond seeing only the danger of sin—its consequences—and find ways to convince our hearts of the grievousness of sin—how it dishonors and grieves the one to whom we owe everything. If we think just of the danger and then confess, we will find that our repentance is self-oriented and we will end up returning to the same character flaws and patterns of wrongdoing again and again.
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We feel that if God is completely in control then our actions don’t matter—or vice versa. But think how practical this is. If we believed that God was in charge and our actions meant nothing, it would lead to discouraged passivity. If on the other hand we really believed that our actions changed God’s plan—it would lead to paralyzing fear. If both are true, however, we have the greatest incentive for diligent effort, and yet we can always sense God’s everlasting arms under us. In the end, we can’t frustrate God’s good plans for us (cf. Jer 29:11).==========
Q. 98. What is prayer? A. Prayer is an offering up of our desires unto God, for things agreeable to his will, in the name of Christ, with confession of our sins, and thankful acknowledgement of his mercies.==========
“we should lay before God, as part of our prayer, the reasons why we think that what we ask for is the best thing.”==========

Modelo de Oração==========
Morning Prayer (25 minutes) APPROACHING GOD Ask him for his presence and help as you read and pray. Choose from one of these scriptural invocations: Psalm 16:8; 27:4, 9–10; 40:16–19; 63:1–3; 84:5–7; 103:1–2; 139:7–10; Isaiah 57:15; Matthew 11:28–30; John 4:23; Ephesians 1:17–19; 3:16–20. BIBLE READING AND MEDITATION (Keep in mind that no one can do all of the following in any one session of meditation and prayer.) To study the passage: Read it three or four times. Then make a list of everything it says about God (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit); list anything that it tells you about yourself; and finally, list any examples to be followed, commands to be obeyed (or things that need to be avoided), and promises to claim. When this is all done, choose the verse and truth that is most striking and helpful to you. Paraphrase the thought or verse in your own words. To meditate on the passage: Write down answers to the following questions: What does this text show me about God for which I should praise or thank him? What does the text show me about my sin that I should confess and repent of? What false attitudes, behavior, emotions, or idols come alive in me whenever I forget this truth? What does the text show me about a need that I have? What do I need to do or become in light of this? How shall I petition God for it? How is Jesus Christ or the grace that I have in him crucial to helping me overcome the sin I have confessed or to answering the need I have? Finally: How would this change my life if I took it seriously—if this truth were fully alive and effective in my inward being? Also, why might God be showing this to me now? What is going on in my life that he would be bringing this to my attention today? PRAYER Pray each of the meditations—adoration, confession, petition, and thanksgiving for Jesus and his salvation. Pray for your needs and pressing concerns. Take a final moment just to enjoy him and his presence.

Jen Pollock Michel: Teach Us To Want

O livro Teach Us to Want de Jen Pollock Michel foi eleito o melhor livro do ano pela revista Christianity Today, veja aqui. 

O livro fala sobre como podemos mudar nossos desejos para desejar a Deus mais do que as outras coisas. Numa análise bem simplista, eu diria que é um livro devocional sobre os problemas filosóficos que James K.A. Smith traz em seus livros.

Qual é o ponto de partida de ambos? Somos aquilo que desejamos. Então, qualquer transformação deve passar por uma transformação do desejo. Se o filósofo analisa o rito e como se dá processo do desejo-imaginação-performance, aqui a autora está mais focada numa transformação através da oração, especialmente, o Pai Nosso.

Pensando assim, o pecado se caracteriza como uma forma de adultério espiritual, que revela que o desejo está no centro da nossa formação e transformação espiritual.

O homem são homo liturgicus, nós orientamos nossas vidas não de acordo com um sistema de crenças ou uma cosmovisão, mas de acordo com os nossos desejos. Cada decisão, grande ou pequena, é um algo direcionado por valor, conscientemente ou não, estamos em busca daquilo que amamos e valorizamos, somos criaturas teleológicas.

He is the I Am who I Am, not the I Am who they wish. (p. 104)

A oração é o caminho para admitir a mudança que não podemos fazer por nós mesmos. A oração é o ato corajoso de levar nossos desejos diante de Deus. A oração é  lugar onde em nome de Jesus encontramos a santidade de Deus como toda a nossa humanidade.

O desejo que se torna corrupto emerge de um coração que pede. eu quero isto e devo ter isto e merecer isto.

This transformation that occurred in Jacob is the change God intends for each of us. Holiness will re-form us: it will reshape the way that we view ourselves as well as the way that we view God. It will change the way that we pray because it will revise our personal desires. It will even change the ways that we most fundamentally understand our identity: “Your name is Jacob; no longer shall your name be called Jacob, but Israel shall be your name” (Genesis 35:10). But in the midst of the metamorphosis of desire, we can yet cling to the confidence that God issues the invitation to ask. (p. 154)

A santidade vem da confissão porque falando alto nosso pecado para outra pessoa é um passo para começar odiar aquilo. Deus é santo, e eu não. A confissão é entender isto.

Forgive us our sins. We confess, agreeing with God on the brokenness and shame and suffering that sin visits upon us, others and, most of all, him. And then we allow Jesus to take it, to shoulder it, to bear it on our behalf. From there we travel light—and walk confidently into greater joy. (p. 171)