Christina Fox, Author at Women.pcacdm.org

The Comfort of Covenant Theology

SARAH IVILL|CONTRIBUTOR One of the things I love to do is sing covenant theology with my children. We have CDs that put the First Catechism: Teaching Children Bible Truths to music, as well as CDs that put the Westminster Shorter Catechism to music. I love both! I have found that we learn the questions and answers better when we sing them. Not only do I love to hear my children sing these truths, I love to sing them too. Whether I’m singing the catechism while doing chores, or while homeschooling, the truths of covenant theology comfort me. Perhaps comfort isn’t the first thing you think of when you hear “covenant theology.” Maybe you’re not even sure what covenant theology is, or if you do, maybe you aren’t confident in explaining it to others. I want to help you associate covenant theology with comfort, and hopefully be better able to teach it to others. We need comfort on a daily basis, and we don’t want to get it from the wrong sources, such as food, shopping, or media. We want to remember that the covenant-making and covenant-keeping God is with us in our physical pain. He is with us in that messy relationship. He is with us as we battle habitual sin. And He is with us as we engage in service. Five Ways Covenant Theology is a Comfort Covenant theology is a comfort because it teaches us that God is the Creator and Redeemer who wants to be in a relationship with His people. He created us to glorify Him and enjoy Him forever, so our greatest satisfaction will always be found in Him. He could have chosen to relate to His people in any number of ways, but He chose to relate to us by way of covenant. We could not have initiated a relationship with God, but amazingly He initiated one with His people. This isn’t a relationship that can be broken; it’s binding. And this isn’t a relationship without structure. It’s grounded in His grace and promises. Furthermore, this isn’t a relationship without security. The blood of God’s Son, Jesus Christ, secures it. Covenant theology is a comfort because it teaches us the promise of God’s presence...

The Comfort of Covenant TheologyChristina Fox2022-05-04T23:08:59+00:00

We Are His: The Great Love of Christ

SHARON ROCKWELL|GUEST The phrase “be my Valentine” conjures up so many different images associated with the celebration of Valentine’s Day: cards with hearts and sugary poems on them, candy and flowers from someone you love, and images of cupids flying around shooting their arrows of affection for their sweethearts. February 14th is represented as the holiday of love, at least by the card and candy companies! A Legend of Love According to tradition, Valentine was a priest in Rome in the third century. At that time Rome was having difficulty getting soldiers to join the military because their spouses objected to them leaving their families. Marriages were therefore outlawed. Valentine defied the government by conducting weddings, but when discovered, was put in jail. One legend has it that Valentine ministered during his jail time. He witnessed to the guards, one of whom had an adopted daughter who was blind. As the story goes, Valentine prayed for the girl and she subsequently regained her sight. The emperor ordered Valentine beheaded, but in his last days, Valentine left a note for the young girl which he signed “from your Valentine.” Valentine was made a saint by the Roman church after his death. By the 18th century, it became popular for those in love to exchange tokens of affection “from their Valentine.” You would think the hearts and flowers of the holiday would turn our heads toward thoughts of love and marriage, but it often has the opposite effect. Those who do not receive some tangible, even expensive, gift may feel disappointed. Those who are single may feel left out. The beauty of love is reduced to a need to receive physical evidence that someone truly cares for us. A Love that Calls Us His Own Christians need to keep a close eye on our feelings during this holiday. Without proper perspective, this holiday can become idolatrous. We are the church, the bride of Christ. Married or single, in love or hopeful, Christ calls believers His bride. We are His...

We Are His: The Great Love of ChristChristina Fox2022-05-04T23:09:46+00:00

Remember the Red Sea Road

When my youngest was little, we took her up the St. Louis Arch. I was excited to have my youngest join me for this notorious St. Louis excursion, and when we entered the cart that makes the slow trek up the steel structure, with excitement I said, “Are you ready?” And then she screamed. I attempted to reassure my daughter, who listened to absolutely none of my comforting words, and then resorted to lollipops and singing. But none of my tricks removed the panic…until we got to the top. With the snap of a finger, all was well again, and she couldn’t get enough of the people below who “looked like ants.” When we visited the arch again several years later, my tween girl seemed a little nervous about the impending cart ride. So, I reminded her multiple times of the fact that she made it up fine the last time, and that she loved the experience once at the top. Remember how much you liked it? Remember? But apparently, she did not because when we entered the cart, she screamed. She was fine once at the top, and while she admired the incredible view, she said, “Mom, next time just remind me that the ride is not so bad.” Right. The Red Sea Road In the book of Exodus, the Israelites also struggled to remember how they had been brought through a great trial. In chapter 14, God’s people are pursued by Pharaoh and his army. And this was not a small group chasing them; we’re told Pharaoh had his horses, chariots, horseman, his entire army. Understandably, the Israelites were exceedingly afraid!..

Remember the Red Sea RoadChristina Fox2022-05-04T23:10:28+00:00

Grafted Into the Family of God

HEATHER MOLENDYK|CONTRIBUTOR The pitted dirt road jostled the muddy pick-up truck as it made its way through the narrow rows of Florida orange trees. Years in the sweltering sun and heavy rains had aged the white truck as much as its driver. Putting the truck in park next to a young orange tree and creaking open the door, Jerry carted over the necessary equipment. Studying the tender trunk of the chosen tree, Jerry’s expert eyes surveyed where the grafting procedure would take place. With one weathered hand holding the lower trunk and the other hand firmly gripping a sharp blade, Jerry began removing some upper branches of the young tree. Though the roots and trunk of this particular tree were healthy and strong, Jerry knew this rootstock would not produce an impressive orange harvest when it was full grown. Because of that weakness, some of the scion (upper portion) of the tree was being removed by Jerry’s sharp blade. In the cut places, healthy branches from another orange tree would be grafted on. Jerry brought over freshly cut branches from another young tree in the orange grove. These branches came from a breed that faithfully produced superior oranges. The fruit from this other tree would be sweet, juicy, and bountiful. With a farmer’s tenderness, Jerry tightly bound the new scion to the original rootstock with grafting tape. Then gathering up his tools, Jerry climbed back into the driver’s seat after tossing the worthless tree branches from the original tree into the bed of the truck. The dead branches would be added to the growing wood pile out back to be used for the family’s bonfire that weekend. A wound is made to the original plant. God created Adam out of the dirt. Noah was chosen among the sinful men roaming the earth. Abram was called out of a pagan land. Isaac was brought to life in a dusty womb. Moses was tasked with leading the Sons of Israel to a land of promise. David was chosen to be king and his lineage was promised to endure forever. Over and over, God’s blessing rested upon a people He had chosen to love. Like a mother hen, His protective wings sheltered the love of His heart from destruction and death. In spite of their holy legacy, God’s people eventually despised their Creator, Rescuer, and King...

Grafted Into the Family of GodChristina Fox2022-05-04T23:11:17+00:00

The Freedom of Union With Christ

My grandparents remember exactly what they were doing when they received news of the bombing of Pearl Harbor. My parents have similarly sharp memories concerning the assassination of JFK. I still clearly remember where I was and what I was doing when I saw the footage of the Twin Towers collapsing. Our complex and beautiful brains have a way of remembering both the shocking and the deeply significant moments that shape our lives. Likewise, I will never forget the day that the theological concept of union with Christ trickled that long eighteen inches from my head to my heart. I remember the exact table at the coffee shop at which I was sitting. I remember the old, tattered book that God used to cement the concept in my soul. I remember that moment because it colored the way I experienced every moment after it! Having come to Christ from an unchurched background, I threw myself headfirst into the Christian life. My husband and I had been in full-time vocational ministry for many years and were in the early years of parenting two under two. On the surface, things were going well, but my soul hit a wall. I was tired and my faith, once vibrant, felt anemic. I was doing all the same things, but my heart felt simultaneously weary and restless. What was I missing? Sitting at a local coffee shop, I prayed that the Lord would restore unto me the joy of my salvation and grant me a willing heart to sustain me (Psalm 51:12). Then God used a little-known book, Bone of His Bone by F.J. Huegel, to open my eyes to the freedom and wonder of union with Christ. What Union with Christ Is Paul describes the mysterious wonder that is union with Christ when writing to the church at Colossae using the phrase, “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). In his letter to the Galatian Church, he speaks further on this incredible reality....

The Freedom of Union With ChristChristina Fox2022-05-04T23:35:39+00:00

Where do Your Burdens Carry You?

Our burdens carry us somewhere. Where do your burdens carry you? 2 Corinthians 12 records a burden Paul carried, a thorn in his flesh. Three times Paul pleaded with God to remove it. But to keep Paul humble, God would not remove it. Paul’s response was to see his suffering as a reason for rejoicing because it revealed Christ’s power at work. “For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” (2 Cor 12:10) A Present-Day Example When I think of people today who have carried burdens for long periods of times, I think of Joni Eareckson Tada. If you have read any of her books you know that Joni attempted a dive into shallow water in the Chesapeake Bay. The moment her head crunched against the sand bottom, she knew she was in trouble. She recalls feeling like her life was over when she learned she was permanently paralyzed. Joni was a Christian at the time and spent those early months praying for healing, getting anointed with oil, confessing every sin that she could recall and attending one healing service after another, until finally she whimpered, “I cannot live this way. I’m so lost. God, show me how to live.” Her burdens drove her to Christ where for over 50 years she has lived in a wheelchair, and describes her life as dying daily to self and rising with Jesus. Joni wrote this about her life: “A ‘no’ answer to my request for a miraculous physical healing has meant purged sin, a love for the lost, increased compassion, stretched hope, an appetite for grace, an increase of faith, a happy longing for heaven, a desire to serve, a delight in prayer, and a hunger for His Word. Oh, bless the stern schoolmaster that is my wheelchair!” The thorn in Joni’s side has never been removed. Her burden carried her straight to Christ’s arms...

Where do Your Burdens Carry You?Christina Fox2022-05-04T23:36:23+00:00

We Are Not Better Than This

JILL WIGGINS|GUEST Earlier this month, I witnessed the assault on our nation’s Capitol with incredulity. In the aftermath, I found myself consuming copious amounts of media examining responses from political leaders, pastors, and news sources. It did not take long before a myriad of politicians from both parties adopted the familiar phrase often uttered by parents and teachers alike to children whose behavior has been disappointing— “We are better than this.'' Although I understand the sentiment and its guilt-eliciting, behavior-changing appeal, I would respectfully and broken heartedly disagree with their proclamation. We as Christians should be the first to point out that “we are not better than this.” I spent the better part of my teenage years thinking that I was “better than this.” I grew up in a small Baptist church in northeast Alabama and our offering envelopes came preprinted on the front with a variety of boxes to check. There was a box for attendance, daily bible reading, offering, and lesson preparation. Every Sunday night at youth group, my goal was to very literally turn in an envelope that checked all the boxes, because along with not drinking, smoking, cussing, or fooling around with boys, that was what “Good Christians” did. In the years since, the list has become more political in nature, but the sentiment is the same. Then and now, there are boxes to check, issues to support, causes to champion. These are things that Christians do. . . and those are things Christians do not do. Though not overtly stated, I perceived that there was “us” and there was “them.” We were good “box-checking” Christians, and “they” were dirty, bad, vile, worldly, sinners. Yet, one Sunday night, the summer following my senior year of high school, I found myself face down on the hook rug on the floor of my bedroom, crying out to God. I realized that I was one of “them.” I was dirty, bad, vile, and worldly. For all my box checking, I was a fraud. A pit formed in my stomach, and I believed that if everyone knew just how really bad I was, how dirty I felt on the inside, no one would ever love me. And that’s when I met Jesus. After all, we must first see the sin in ourselves to grasp the wonder of God’s grace. Paul in his letter to Timothy states that “Christ came into the world to save sinners of whom I am foremost” (1 Tim. 1:15). Present tense. Jesus came into the world to save sinners like me. Sinners. Like me. And that is the good news. That is the gospel. That is grace...

We Are Not Better Than ThisChristina Fox2022-05-04T23:37:26+00:00

Introducing the Heidelberg Catechism to Children

ANN MARIE MO| GUEST What are your favorite comfort foods? On a chilly winter day, I crave a steaming bowl of homemade chicken noodle soup, paired with a hearty chunk of freshly baked bread. Comfort foods satisfy our bellies and warm us up from head to toe. Just as our physical bodies require sustenance, our souls ache for comfort and nourishment too. Many people feed their souls with temporal things—possessions, relationships, and financial success. But these perishable gifts cannot impart lasting peace or satisfaction, for God has created our souls with a hunger that only he can satisfy. Jesus confirms this in his words: “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall not hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst” (John 6:35). For Christian parents, it is a critical task to pass biblical truth on to our children, for them to know that true peace and satisfaction are rooted only in the Lord Jesus Christ and his atoning work on the cross. To teach our children the basics of our Christian faith, many excellent catechisms exist. What Is a Catechism? During the Reformation, many pastors wrote catechisms to provide a systematic method of teaching the Bible to God’s people. In the form of simple questions and answers, a catechism summarizes key biblical doctrines. Questions build incrementally on one another and provide a basic understanding of Christianity. But aren’t catechisms old-fashioned? Won’t children think catechizing is boring? Providentially, many engaging resources exist today to spark our children’s interest in catechisms and to introduce them to the richness of these works. For our children to know true biblical comfort in this fallen world, we must train them diligently from Scripture and catechisms provide an effective method of training. The Heidelberg Catechism, written in 1563 by two pastors, is a compendium of biblical truth that is essentially a book of comfort. While the catechism covers the Gospel, the Apostles’ Creed, the Ten Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, and other biblical topics, it presents these subjects in the context of the catechism’s first question: “What is your only comfort in life and in death?”[i] This theme of comfort resonates throughout the catechism. The English word comfort derives from the Latin word confortare, which means to strengthen greatly. The two Latin roots, con and fortis, literally mean with strength. So, the idea conveyed in biblical comfort is something far more profound than in comfort food. The comfort that God imparts from his eternal Word by the Holy Spirit strengthens his people to persevere and to grow in Christ through hardships....

Introducing the Heidelberg Catechism to ChildrenChristina Fox2022-05-04T23:39:25+00:00

Waiting Beyond the Waiting

CHRISTINE GORDON|GUEST Much of 2020 was about waiting. Waiting to see how the virus will spread, waiting to see if the kids will go back to school, waiting to see if we’ll be able to go to church in person or if we’ll have to worship in our living rooms again. The church has just made its way through another year of advent, a time when we expect to wait. We mark it and celebrate it. But now the holidays have come and gone. And unlike new years in the past, the change in our calendars this time may feel more like a mockery than a fresh start. Instead of the new or different we had hoped for, we find ourselves waiting again, enduring. The other day I was half listening to the news on the radio as I drove when I heard this headline, “It is an historic day for a woman in Great Britain, who is the first person in the world to receive a vaccine for the Coronavirus.” I listened as the woman in her 90s expressed her surprise and delight, saying she was overwhelmed at the opportunity to be the first to be immunized. And then I started crying. Living in Hope Maybe it was her sweet British accent and the gratitude in her voice. But in my body I felt profound relief. Finally help was coming. Finally the hundreds and thousands of deaths would be slowed, the hospital admissions would go down, the children would play on playgrounds again without worrying about the distance between them. I knew none of these things would happen immediately, but suddenly there was a hope in my heart that felt like life and joy, energy and motivation. This locked down, lonely, mask-wearing, death-fearing existence might be our present reality. But it would not be our future. I do not now know the date when the world will go back to normal, whatever the new normal looks like. I do not have access to the name of the last person who will die from the Corona virus. I don’t know when my husband, who is diabetic and a heart attack survivor, will be vaccinated, therefore alleviating some of the anxiety my children and I carry every day. But because I know protection for him and all of us is coming, my outlook has begun to change. The ground beneath me seems to have shifted from a downward ramp toward the unknown and scary to an upward path of hope and possibility. I do not need to know specifics for my heart to begin to relax and believe that we might make it through. Is this not the experience of the Christian life? Even when we are fully on the other side of the pandemic, there will still be loss, grief, and tragedy....

Waiting Beyond the WaitingChristina Fox2022-05-04T23:40:14+00:00

Words Matter: Honoring the Sanctity of Life with our Words

STEPHANIE HUBACH|CONTRIBUTOR Words matter. Several years ago, when I was working for Mission to North America (MNA) as Special Needs Ministries Director, I was on my way out the door for a trip to Atlanta. With a glint in his eye, my younger son Tim (who has Down syndrome) looked at me and quipped, “Remember: MNA means ‘Mom’s Not Around!’” Whether that remark was shared in the spirit of “It’s boys’ weekend at the Hubach house” or, “You travel too much Mom,” I’m still not sure. If you are a Mom, however, you can guess how I heard it. Words matter. Their meaning matters. Their delivery matters. And all of that matters because the people to whom those words are directed matter. In January each year, many Christians celebrate Sanctity of Human Life Sunday. But what do we mean when we say “sanctity?” And how ought that to inform our not only our message, but our delivery? “Sanctity” is actually very close to the word holiness. In particular, it is akin to the “quality of being sacred, or by law (especially by natural or divine law) immune from violation.” When we speak of the sanctity of human life, we are often focused on calling out the violation of abortion and, instead, promoting the biblical warrant of protecting human life—from conception to natural death. As Christians who uphold the authority of Scripture, we ought to always protect the vulnerable—including the unborn—so that they might be “immune from violation,” the ultimate violation being the experience of intentional death. May we always remain faithful to this. At the same time, however, we need to carefully share our message of being pro-life—"for the life of my neighbor”—in a way that is immune from violation as well. Have you ever thought of your words as a weapon? Have you ever considered that good concepts can be presented in a way that actually “undoes the goodness” via the violence of language? In a world of tweets and texts, it is very easy for us to lose sight of this. Snark can creep in. Our words can suddenly become curt, sarcastic, cutting, demeaning, and brutal. Rather than focusing on private righteous action, we can find ourselves simply trying to illicit a public raging reaction—one that unquestioningly affirms the validity of our view, while harshly discrediting that of another...

Words Matter: Honoring the Sanctity of Life with our WordsChristina Fox2022-05-04T23:41:02+00:00

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