We're now over halfway through with this sabbatical. I'm so thankful to the Lord and to you. I know he doesn't spoil any of his children in the way that he'd create little brats, but the extravagance of his grace to me, much of which comes through you, my church family, has me feeling spoiled.

My reading this week took me through Dustin Benge's recent release, The Loveliest Place: The Beauty and Glory of the Church (Crossway). I think this is another important subject for us in America. Generally, we have an underdeveloped theology of the church. Much of what used to be assumed and taken for granted as I was growing up has now been lost or challenged or rejected altogether. The church is central to God's plan in this age. Benge's book helps us to see that. I found it fairly comprehensive in its treatment of the subject, very readable and accessible, and thoroughly biblical both in the way it addresses specific texts and in the way it fits textual teaching in a trinitarian and biblical theology.

I thought I might spend a little bit more space on something else, however. I love reading, and I love books. And the most significant book I've been reading, the most significant book anyone can read, is the Bible. I mentioned in my sabbatical handout that I'm giving my time during these four months to one OT and one NT text. If Dr. Warren is leading our church family to clamber through Colossians, I have personally been sauntering through Psalm 92. Or is it planting myself in Psalm 92. What's an obsessive alliteterater to do with a silent p?

Anyway, I'm loving the chance to slow down in a text without the looming deadline of a sermon less than a week away, though I am, in a sense, preparing a sermon. I'm trying to preach to myself. And if my sermon for myself is any good, I may share it with you when I return to the pulpit.

Psalm 92, you may know, ends with the praising of the Lord for his blessing of his people in giving them "fruit in old age" (v. 14). That's what attracted me to the text. That's what I'm seeking and praying for.

The first sermon I'm preaching to myself has to do with the fruit itself, the produce, what it is and what it isn't. It isn't the same as the flourishing of the evildoers (v 7). Their flourishing is like the grass--here today, gone tomorrow. The flourishing of God's people is like a tree--a palm or a cedar (vv 12-14). It is also connected to an anointing in verse 10. That probably has reference to the Holy Spirit's power behind the fruit, but it also points to THE anointed One, the Christ. The fruit God's promised is Christlikeness in his people, by the Spirit.

So I'm setting my heart and prayers and goals and strategies on this promised fruitfulness. I don't want my pursuits to be shaped by the world's definition of success or fruitfulness. I'm trying to be not conformed to the world, but to be transformed by the renewing of my mind. I don't want to set my sights only on a nest egg that insures a comfy retirement, or even on a bigger church attendance or budget. I want to cultivate a deeper relationship with the Lord Jesus so that I am a clearer reflection of the Lord Jesus, for the blessing of my wife and family, my church family, the world around us, and myself. I think that's what God wants for me...and for you, too.

By His Grace & For His Glory,