John Piper is a pretty regular guy. A pretty regular guy who is passionate about Jesus Christ. He writes books, drops heart-piercing sermons, likes to hyphenate words together, and has managed to gather a lot of biblical wisdom into his noggin over the years.

Last week he did a live version of his “Ask Pastor John” [APJ] series – in which he fields questions and does his best to answer them biblically and pastorally. With almost no reservations, I enjoy APJ. Thus, I enjoyed watching him respond live as questions came in via Twitter.

My hope is that you can enjoy it too, now that the segments are posted on DesiringGod. Check them out here:

Ask Pastor John Live

Welcome to a new look, a new name, a new location, and a reinvigorated sense of purpose.

There’s a lot of work left for me to do, but I trust this early iteration will be both helpful and appealing. If you have any suggestions or comments, please let me know. At present, I’m hurriedly categorizing, editing, and tagging my archive of 800+ posts.

It is my prayer that this place will be home to many years of quality writing. Writing that provides insight into the many facets of music and literary criticism – not to mention turning you on to some great tunes and reads in the process.  Writing that gives insight into the inner workings of one unfinished person being sanctified and reformed. Writing that challenges readers with careful exposition of Scripture – God’s divine revelation to mankind.

Most of all, my desire is that this be a place where Jesus Christ is glorified and honoured as Saviour, Lord, and God.

My name is Jerry Bolton, and you’re reading the resonance of my reformation.
Thanks for stopping by.

Yesterday, Michael Jackson died. I’ll be truthful – most of my exposure to him was through Weird Al (“eat it”) and Disney stuff when I was a kid. Never much cared for pop music, nor its “king”. Although I can certainly respect his impact on music, my sadness at his passing is not one of regret and admiration, but of pity. He was a man destroyed by the sins of his father, the trap of his money, and the war of self-loathing and self-idolatry that so clearly marked his life. Although I hope he met Jesus in a real way before his death, there’s nothing to suggest that happened.

Needless to say, his death has gotten me thinking, and I had some thoughts I was going to share… but in his usual fashion, Tim Challies said my thoughts for me in his own way. You can read them here.

Posting more regularly is a promise I often make here, and it’s probably my most often broken promise (not that I break many, I hope). It would be interesting sometime to aggregate through all the last 5 years of posts and trace every broken promise to post more. Interesting, but largely meaningless.

I recently got sucked into the swirling nether vortex known as Twitter, and you can find me here, tweeting away. I figured that my compulsion to update my Facebook status deserved a more fitting arena for its execution. So far, I’ve been quite impressed. I love the adless, clean simplicity of it. I also love knowing what many of my heroes and inspirations are doing with their everyday lives (although that in itself makes twitter feel far more voyeuristic than Facebook has ever been, though I suppose the lack of photographs makes it less so in reality). This is particularly true when aforementioned heroes and inspirations are, for example, in the studio recording that new record, releasing an update to software I use regularly, or what have you. Knowing these things in realtime is handy-dandy.

So, shameless tweetvertising aside, life is good. This will be an update. In approximately a month and two days, I will be a university graduate. That much is certain, although it is contingent on my completion of about 7 odd projects, papers, and assignments between now and then, most of them sizeable. Foregone conclusions, though, eh?

Lately I, and my wife with me (usually), have been enjoying the swirling and ephemeral sounds of The Rocket Summer, Thrice, The Appleseed Cast, Mute Math, Mae, Celldweller, Nobuo Uematsu, and, on occasion, a little Underoath, Living Sacrifice, and Mars Ill. Oh, and I mustn’t forget Brandon Heath, Bebo Norman, Remedy Drive, Derek Webb, Aaron Shust, and whatnot.

Musical preferences aside, we’re as-they-say “chugging along”. Weekends are full of more happenings and happenstance than weekdays (and thus tend to be busier, if that were possible). I’m back to my old ways as part of the Worship team at our church, helping run Sound Tech a couple times a month – Mixing and Matching and Mastering and trying to Make-things-sound-real-good and such. It’s a fun exercise for my ears and (sometimes) my reflexes. Steph is back to her old ways teaching Sunday School once a month also. We’re really starting to feel like it’s “home”, friendships are starting to firm up, we’re starting to know most of the people by name (at least the major players), our small group has been an encouragement and a blessing, and we’ve been on the requisite dinner date (discovering friends who share our passion for 24, board games that are fun, good coffee, and doing life for Jesus). Not that we didn’t have friends like that already, but more is always good, ya?

With regards to my “second reformation” series, I do still plan to pick it up in some form. I suppose the problem is that views and thoughts are always evolving, and so unless one keeps at a body of work consistently, it can run away – or, better put, it can grow its own legs and mind and evolve into something beyond your control (kind of like children?). This is to say, in order to pick it up, I really need to map out where I want to go, decide what specifically I want to say (and to whom), and get my head around things. I also need to re-think what I want to call it – I’ve decided that Reformation is too strong a word for my thoughts (particularly after reading a few Emergent authors claim their movement is a new “reformation” – ugh). Perhaps it will be “Jerry’s Thoughts for the Future of Autonomous Local Churches (particularly the Open Brethren of Ontario)” or something, I guess that would be more specific, eh?

Musings aside, I’m in a good place right now. Small Group is starting into a study on the Foundations of Discipleship which PROMISES (indeed, all but GUARANTEES) revelations and challenges grandiose and meaningful. School plugs away; I can smell the finish line, I can see the work that lies before me, and I can know beyond a shadow that ‘this too shall pass’. Marriage is still the best thing on God’s green earth, and Steph the best Thing.

Jesus is sweet and terrible, wondrous and dangerous, full of majesty and full of ways to tear my Self apart… He’s “the Image of the Invisible God” and I love Him for it, even as He takes me, breaks me, and makes me something new again and again. Praise God for the Cross, the Life, the Way. Nothing else in this finite universe compares with the Infinite One.

Saturday morning (I mean afternoon) quibble: “Infinite One” is an oxymoron, but I’m overlooking that because it frankly doesn’t matter. God is One and God is Infinite. So, to call him the Infinite One is sensible even as it is a mystery and a challenge to my finite (grey) matter.

Steph was sharing with me this morning about a passage in John she found rather interesting. Specifically, John 1:45-51:

John 1:45-51 ESV
Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.” Nathanael said to him, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip said to him, “Come and see.” Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said of him, “Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no deceit!” Nathanael said to him, “How do you know me?” Jesus answered him, “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.” Nathanael answered him, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!” Jesus answered him, “Because I said to you, ‘I saw you under the fig tree,’ do you believe? You will see greater things than these.” And he said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.”

Specifically, she was wondering about the significance of the fig tree. What was it about being seen under this tree that caused this kind of rapturous and, dare I say, salvific response from Nathaniel?

We received a little help from our good old friend C.H. Spurgeon on this one. You can read his sermon on the passage [here]. Here is the portion relevant to answering Steph’s question (which by this point had become my own as well):

But what was Nathanael doing under the fig tree, according to our best surmise? Well, as devout Easterns are accustomed to have a special place for prayer, this may have been a shadowy fig tree under which Nathanael was accustomed to offer his devotions. And perhaps just before Philip came to him, he may have been engaged in personal and solitary confession of sin. He had looked round the garden and fastened the gate that none might come in—and he had poured into the ear of his God some very tender confession under the fig tree shade. When Christ said to him, “When you were under the fig tree,” it brought to his recollection how he poured out his broken and his contrite spirit, and confessed sins unknown to all but God. That confession, it may be, the very look of Christ brought back to his remembrance and the words and look together seemed to say, “I know your secret burden, and the peace you found in rolling it upon the Lord.” He felt, therefore, that Jesus must be Israel’s God.
-Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Nathaniel and the Fig Tree (emphasis mine)

With our question essentially resolved, I found it quite remarkable to peruse the remainder of what Spurgeon had to say in the remainder of this exposition. Here’s another meaningful excerpt which struck me as so very true of our present age just as it apparently was in Spurgeon’s over 100 years ago:

Nathanael was just the very opposite of all this. He was no hypocrite and no crafty deceiver. He wore his heart upon his sleeve. If he spoke, you might know that he said what he meant and that he meant what he said. He was a childlike, simple-hearted man, transparent as glass. He was not one of those fools who believe everything. But on the other hand, he was not of that other sort of fools so much admired in these days who will believe nothing, but who find it necessary to doubt the most self-evident Truth in order to maintain their credit for profound philosophy. These “thinkers” of this enlightened age are great at quibbles, mighty in feigning or feeling mistrust concerning matters which common sense has no doubts about.

They will profess to doubt whether there is a God, though that is as plain as the sun at noonday. No, Nathanael was neither credulous nor mistrustful. He was honestly ready to yield to the force of Truth. He was willing to receive testimony and to be swayed by evidence. He was not suspicious, because he was not a man who, himself, would be suspected. He was true-hearted and straightforward—a plain dealer and plain speaker. Cana had not within her gates a more thoroughly honest man. Philip seems to have known this, for he went to him directly, as to a man who was likely to be convinced and worth winning to the good cause.
-Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Nathaniel and the Fig Tree (emphasis mine)

I can’t count the times, as I’ve sat in my post-postmodern university classes where, having dismissed both God and Relativism, my peers and profs are left grasping for the proverbial straws to try and come up with some meaningful basis for ethics and metaphysics and life and existence and all of the deeper questions and things about which human inquiry has always revolved; they are too numerous to… number. I’m always amazed at the lengths to which men and women will go in their attempts to absolve themselves of their culpability before Christ who is both merciful and just.

May we be much more like Nathaniel, believing Christ for who He truly is… than like the fools who really believe in nothing – and where I say nothing we might insert alternately “themselves” or “science” or any other human construct or concept that is not the one true God of the Bible.

After all, all other explanations will always leave us cold and empty in the end.

…and with the Apostle to cry out:

1 Peter 1:3-9 ESV (emphasis mine)
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith–more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire–may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

Welcome to my first proper blog series, entitled “The Second Reformation”. A heavy title, if ever there was one. I don’t claim to be the new Martin Luther… far from it! There are much better contenders to take up that mantle. Some of them were instrumental in shaping and influencing my thoughts of late as I have struggled with some questions; some troubling, “preoccupying questions”. These questions have formed the basic root of what I hope to address in this series. I will share them with you shortly.

In his 2007 book Everything Must Change, author Brian McLaren began with his own set of troubling, “preoccupying questions”. I won’t go into much detail about McLaren or his book here, as that’s not my aim. I probably won’t surprise anyone reading this by saying that I’m really not much of a fan of his work. As best as I can discern, the book is an attempt to re-cast and re-new his reader’s understanding of what it is and what it looks like when we follow Jesus Christ. No small or insignificant task.

McLaren approached this task by setting a foundation of two “preoccupying questions” which have formed the basis from which the book issued forth. Respectfully, they are:

01. What Are the Biggest Problems in the World?
02. What Does Jesus Have to Say About These Global Problems?
Brian McLaren, Everything Must Change pp. 11-12)

I can agree with McLaren’s title with one addition: A subtitle. It should read “Everything Must Change (But God)”. Brian McLaren attempts to deal with real, difficult issues, but he starts in the wrong place – both of his questions are human-centric. From the language of his second question (labelling the problems as “Global”), it doesn’t take an expert in modern textual criticism to gather that he feels the biggest problems in the world are the ones that affect “everything” – or, perhaps, everybody? At first, this seems sensible… after all, aren’t the most important problems the big ones that affect everybody?

I’m inclined, after getting past “at first”, to disagree.

After all, who is Brian McLaren? Who gave him the knowledge, understanding, and authority to decide what the “Biggest Problems in the World” are? To the best of my knowledge, the answer to both is “nobody”. The same is true of me.

Before I get into the difficult bits of unravelling my grey-matter about subjects to which I’m probably not qualified to wax prosaic, I have something very deep and important to admit: I’m nobody. Consequently, what I think the big problems of the world are is rather irrelevant.

Therefore, here are my troubling, preoccupying questions, which form the basis of everything I hope to touch on from this point:

00. Who is God?
01. What Does He Say the Biggest Problems Are?
02. What Does He Say is My Responsibility?

I feel it’s important to set the stage in this way because otherwise it’s too easy for me to give commentary and amusing detours without really accomplishing much. Nothing I can say about my topics will really mean much unless I’m building on a firm foundation of who God is and what He has revealed to us in His Word(s).

Allow me to expand on my first question:

00. Who is God?

Without intending to avoid the most important question of all, I feel this one is best answered elsewhere. Most of my readership knows what I believe and (hopefully) why I believe it, but for the sake of reference, I generally align myself with the Reformed Theological tradition and the Doctrines of Grace. I believe that God is real and that He has revealed as much of Himself as we can handle in His Word, the Bible. Inclusive in that, I believe that He has also revealed Himself most completely when He came in the person of Jesus Christ and that the Bible gives us the fullness of what we need as to His story. Specifically, I believe that all of History hangs on the death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Christ – all of these capture the heart of Scripture, which is that God’s primary aim is always to bring glory to Himself. I believe that there is far more to God than is in the Scriptures, but that they give us everything we need – thus anything beyond that is mystery and intended as such.

In short, and very generally, I believe in the evangelical distinctives and orthodox tenets of the Christian faith inasmuch as they belie a careful and Spirit-led understanding of the Scriptures. There is no one writer or person who has it all correct, and anyone who claims to is probably very far off the mark. That being said, my influences have included such men (past and present) as John Piper, Mark Driscoll, CJ Mahaney, CH Spurgeon, JI Packer, Francis Schaeffer, Timothy Keller, DA Carson, and many others. I don’t agree with any one of them in all areas, but I agree with all of them in some areas.

I think that’s healthy, and I could be wrong. For the most part, my theology isn’t up for grabs and is the result of years of studying, hearing, and seeing God’s word interact with myself and many others. It will always be evolving in some aspects as I learn and grow and study and see more of life and Scripture. Essentially, though, this is where I’m at, and will be at.

If you aren’t familiar with this understanding of God, either from a Christian perspective or from that of someone who is “outside” and has no idea what half/all of what I just said means, I would point you in a few directions (which tend to have the same endgame):

First, a presentation of The Gospel by Mark Driscoll.

Second, a general plug for the views shared on these fine websites: Desiring God and Mars Hill. There are loads of other good resources, but those are a good starting place if you have no idea where I’m coming from.

That about wraps up the most basic foundation of all that is to come – after all, what we think about God is our most defining characteristic as human beings. If you (for the most part) share in my beliefs about who God is (or even if you don’t really agree about the whole Reformed theology bit, but are on board with “The One True God is the God of the Bible and He revealed Himself as Jesus”), then I invite you to join me for what is to come.

And here is what is to come, what I’ve promised to write about, and what I’ve been delving through these past few months (years?):

01. What Does He Say the Biggest Problems Are?

There are many things God lays out in His Word, the Bible, as being “Big Problems”. Things such as my Sin and all the myriad branches and effects thereof, the World I inhabit, and many other things. Most likely, all of them will touch and affect the one I’ve chosen to discuss (revealed in a few lines!).

02. What Does He Say is My Responsibility?

This is kind of what we’re all getting at: What do we do when we know things are broken and messed up and definitely “not what they ought to be”? What am I supposed to do/think/pray/feel/be about this? And so on.

I believe, along with many of you, and maybe even Brian McLaren (ha!), that right now – perhaps even all the time, one of God’s biggest “problems” is the Church, both local and universal. It is my intent to explore this topic of Ecclesiology (the study of the Church) through the utilization of these two questions applied to it:

01. What Does God Say the Biggest Problems with the Church are?
02. What Does He Say is My Responsibility?

It is my intent over the coming weeks and months to delve into these questions. For my sake and yours, and most of all for the Glory of God.

The title of this series is going to be “The Second Reformation”. I’ve named it that because, as we’re about to explore together, I believe that a second reformation of the Church is coming, probably within my lifetime (assuming that, Lord willing, I live for a normal lifetime). The first Protestant Reformation saw a reformation of theology, doctrine, and organization revolving around the five “Sola’s”: Sola Scriptura, Sola Fide, Sola Gratia, Solus Christus, and Soli Deo Gloria. The coming Second Reformation, I believe, will build on that foundation – once again reforming the church, this time reforming Protestantism itself, which in the West and elsewhere has become just as faulty, unbiblical, and often counter-productive for Christ as the “Catholic” church of Europe was in its time. Its emphases will be the same, but with additions. Once again, theology, doctrine, and organization will play a primary role. This time, however, there will be a variety of new elements of church which receive the reformation treatment: methodology, missiology, worship-ology (is that a word?), and various other smaller aspects. It will serve as a reaction in some ways to both the “emergent church” conversation/movement, as well as the “house church” movement, though (despite the role those two movements will play as touchpoints) hopefully not a complete pendulum swing to either. There’s a lot of things it might be, and some of it may not happen yet. I’m no prophet, just a nobody… and “The Second Reformation” is, I think, a fitting and perhaps subtly self-deprecating title. In truth, I might as well entitle it “The Second Trillionth Reformation” since, through sanctification, we are reformed daily and even “second-ly”. I’ll never live up to the heights of its demands, but hopefully this title will spur both you and I on to following and serving Christ as a part of His church more effectively, efficiently, faithfully, actively, and sacrificially for His glory. May the Reformation begin in my heart and yours.

It’s a quiet morning on the Bolton front. We’re up, with strong brewed coffee about to course through our veins at a quick rate (“rappers bored with hip-hop? just wrap your face with grip-tape”) and we’re listening to worship tunes (good ones), and praying that God would shake us up, shake you up, shake everyone up today. In a good, good way.

We love and miss you guys. Peterborough, TCF, family, friends, children of the above – have a great Sunday and join us worshipping the one true God of the universe who loves you and died, was buried, and rose again conquering sin and death and reigns forever and is forever praised and glorious.

Amen. Rock it.

Today I watched Mark Driscoll’s recent appearance at the 2008 Desiring God conference which was entitled: “How Sharp the Edge? Christ, Controversy, and Cutting Words”.

Suffice it to say, it is Driscoll at his very best. I’m still digesting what I’ve heard, but the challenge to me (and perhaps even more so to many I know) is going to be immense applying some of what he has brought to the attention of this branch of theological persuasion I call home.

Do watch it. <3

Stories about the persecuted church can be rather difficult to tell – in part because of the content, in part because of security issues, and in part because it’s just very difficult to convey the immense gravity and piercing pressure of the situations being retold. This is particularly true when we consider the persecuted church in the Islamic nations of the Middle East where the cost of choosing Christ is always high – costs such as imprisonment, estrangement from family and society, and very frequently… death.

It’s no surprise then, that the authors of Secret Believers: What Happens When Muslims Believe In Christ chose the format they did to tell this story – a collage of sorts, compiling and interlacing the accounts of many converts to Christianity within Islamic countries into a narrative, almost novel-like story. The resulting book is gripping and, quite frankly, hard to set aside. It’s also challenging, and at times very difficult to read. The overwhelming sense of surveillance, suspicion, and the impending threat of harm or worse alights on nearly every page. Thankfully, this dark shadow is offset by constant reminders and evidences of God’s faithfulness amidst trying circumstances.

The book takes place in an unnamed Middle Eastern country and follows a number of characters, which are “in many cases… composites of more than one individual”. This is done both to protect those whose stories are being told, and so that the stories can be told as accurately as possible. It’s effective – I found that as I worked my way through the narrative I was drawn in by the characters very completely.

All of that being said, I do not wish to spoil the stories for you – they are best read in their entirety and not in a summarized fashion, and further they serve a larger purpose to the reader of illustrating the plight of the persecuted church in Islamic nations. The book is closed with a brief chapter which more explicitly discusses the question of “How shall we respond?”. Although typically I dislike it when books tell me what I was supposed to have learned, or how I was supposed to have been affected by the book… this section is brilliant. I found that by the time I reached it I was not only in tears, but glad for some insight into how not only to help these dear brothers and sisters, but also how to approach the Muslims around me (and their number is rising exponentially as immigration from Middle Eastern nations grows yearly).

Secret Believers is an amazing book, well put-together, and very practically-oriented. I recommend it wholeheartedly – to anyone interested in more effectively sharing Christ with their Muslim friends, to anyone interested in understanding the persecuted church in Islamic nations, and to any believer interested in what God is doing in parts of the world which outwardly seem so hostile to the gospel. It’s not only a great read, but a powerful reminder of God’s goodness and provision, not to mention His ability to sustain His people through the most incredible of circumstances.

5 (choose an arbitrary counter) out of 5.

The gist is: We love these vows, we hope you do too. If you want to use them, ask us, we’ll almost definitely say yes – we just like to know who’s using them.

Here ya go:

I, Jerry Taylor Bolton, take you, Stephanie Ruth Jenkinson, to be my wife. I recognize that God has blessed me with your love and entrusted your life to me as a gift that I have not earned. In recognition of this, I promise to sacrificially love you as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. I promise to courageously protect, fearlessly guide, selflessly serve, and generously provide for you, as he enables me. Through the pressures of the present, and the uncertainties of the future, I promise you my complete faithfulness; body, mind, and soul. I promise to lead you through all of life’s experiences even as the Lord leads me, that together we will grow in the likeness of Christ and establish a family that brings him glory and honour. I promise never to half-mean, never to half-love, and never to halve us – now that God has made us one. May the LORD deal with me as He sees fit if anything but death or His return parts me from you. These are my promises to you before God and the witnesses gathered here today.

I, Stephanie Ruth Jenkinson, take you, Jerry Taylor Bolton, to be my husband. I recognize that God has blessed me with your love and entrusted your life to me as a gift that I have not earned. In recognition of this, I promise to respectfully submit to you as the church submits itself to Christ by following his leadership. I promise to tenderly encourage, fearlessly follow, selflessly serve, and humbly counsel you as he enables me. Through the pressures of the present, and the uncertainties of the future, I promise you my complete faithfulness; body, mind, and soul. I promise to follow you through all of life’s experiences even as the church follows Christ, that together we will grow in the likeness of Christ and establish a family that brings him glory and honour. I promise never to half-mean, never to half-love, and never to halve us – now that God has made us one. May the LORD deal with me as He sees fit if anything but death or His return parts me from you. These are my promises to you before God and the witnesses gathered here today.

Jer & Steph’s Weddding Vows™ are ©2008 The Conglomerate International Corp. Unauthorized use will suck, and will probably doom your marriage. Asking permission is fun, good for your health, and Jesus most likely encourages you to do so. Almost for sure.

Side note: the “half mean, half love, halve us” part is taken from one of my recent poems.

Feel free to leave a note if you dig. ^_^

Side note: this was post #750. Not bad for ~5yrs.